There is no cure for bibliophilia

The San Francisco Calamity by Earthquake and Fire


The library gets so many wonderful book donations. And while most of them are intended for the semiannual Friends of the Library Used Book Sale, some of them have become just too deteriorated to sell and so they are sent to Creafill to be recycled. Of course, we library employees get to take a first look through these even before they are handed over to the Friends; and in this way, I have managed to snag a few (very old) battered books with broken, rotted spines but absolutely beautiful covers that are relatively intact. Newer books just aren't made with this sort of care and skill anymore. These hard covers will have fantastic illustrations engraved into the fabric covering the book board, the titles printed in fabulously decorative fonts. Like any good bibliophile, I couldn't bear to see these books thrown out or even recycled. These covers are ART.

The Red Fairy Book by Andrew Lang
So when I come across a book that meets these requirements, one that has a cover that affects me in some way, I bring it home. I pull out my trusty exacto-knife and separate the beautiful cover from its malignant body. Then I search through my stores of vintage fabrics to find a good pairing with the newly liberated book cover. When I find the fabric I want, I cut the appropriate size of it and glue it to the back board of a picture frame as a sort of reverse matting. Then I center the book cover on this fabric covered board and glue it in place. Once I put the mounted cover behind the glass of the frame, it is a piece of art ready to be hung on my wall. 

I love these guys.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

"Imago" on Hannibal season finale

Image
While watching the eagerly-awaited season 2 finale of Hannibal (one of my absolute favorite TV shows of the moment), I was happily surprised when a vocabulary lesson emerged mid-conversation between Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham. — "Do you know what an imago is, Will?" — "It's a flying insect." — "It's the last stage of a transformation." — "When you become who you will be?" — "It's also a term from the dead religion of psychoanalysis. An imago is an image of a loved one, buried in the unconscious, carried with us all our lives." — "An ideal." — "The concept of an ideal." Of course this term, in both of its definitions, has some great significance for me. It is a word I didn't even know until I stumbled across it in my dictionary browsing and knew immediately that this is the title of my chapbook . It was perfect. So when it snuck up on me again in my favorite TV show, in
Read more

There are birds here

Image
We are now in the full porch-swing of summer, which means Summer Poetry Salons at my beloved Lit House. In celebration of the second salon of the summer on June 24 (tomorrow!), I was given the unbelievably fun task of designing and printing a letterpress broadside for Jamaal May's poem "There Are Birds Here,"  a love song for Detroit. As much I loved this poem on my first reading (and second and third), it was a particularly difficult design challenge. Don't get me wrong — there are so many ways  to illustrate this poem because it is so packed with images. But to illustrate it in a way that actually adds to the text, that builds on the complex foundation set down by the poet — that is the challenge to be met. That is the challenge we always aim to meet at the Literary House Press .   So that means no birds and no buildings. For me, those are the two most obvious, but least important images in this poem. Those details are just the shell around the actual poem
Read more

On the end of a year & a decade: 2019

Image
In this last month of the year, I've had five poems accepted by three different literary journals and two new reviews of my book appear in The Cincinnati Review  and Harbor Review . I also completed the letterpress printing of the Rossetti Prize broadside for American Literary Review , designs for four more digital broadsides , and the initial edits & contributor proofs for Cherry Tree 's sixth issue. Whew! It's been an amazing and overwhelming and utterly fulfilling year ; and I'm riding into the new year on 2019's coattails.  Also featuring the gorgeous handmade scarf that Jehanne Dubrow wove for me this past year. One of my favorite December inventories will always be reflecting on a year's worth of personal accomplishments and progress. By the time the end of the year arrives, it's so easy to forget all that happened just a few short months ago. Making a list has a way of bringing it all into perspective. Here's my roundup for the yea
Read more