The second weekend of June 2019 promises to be unmissable for book lovers as a major new fair will open every day between Thursday 6 and Sunday 9 June. For the first time the flagship summer book fairs of the ABA and PBFA will coincide with the annual London Map Fair and Etc Fairs' Bloomsbury Book Fair.
The annual fall gathering for booklovers, the Boston International Antiquarian Book Fair returns to the Hynes Convention Center in Boston’s beautiful Back Bay for its 42nd year, November 16-18, 2018.
For many ILAB affiliates and book collectors, August is the month of holidays, settling down with a book, of travel and exploring historic places. Why not be inspired by one of the many exceptional books on libraries and book history that were published over the course of last year? To be continued...
Antiques Trade Gazette (ATG) on 6th August 2018: The European Union’s plan to introduce new laws on the import of cultural goods, due to be voted on this summer, has been delayed until September.
The Irish Times spoke to ILAB affiliated bookseller Will de Burca about social media in a rare book business, fine Irish bindings and a catalogue dedicated to the women of Ireland.
Rare Book Hub has just published an interview with UK based rare bookseller Simon Beattie who set up a Facebook Group called " We Love Endpapers" in 2016 which now has almost 2500 members - proof that the beauty of a printed book still resonates in the digital era. Maybe now even more so than before?
The Art Newspaper reports: "The foundations of a Roman building that is probably the oldest library in Germany have been uncovered in central Cologne in archaeological excavations..."
Every year, the German, Austrian and Swiss associations organize a unique seminar with related excursions to bibliophile treasures in the German-speaking countries. This year's seminar will take place in Hanover, Bargfeld and Celle, opening doors to some less known places of German literary history.
Antiquarian booksellers John Windle and Chris Loker have just announced to fund an annual lecture series: “The Windle - Loker Lecture Series on the History of the Illustrated Book." in association with the Book Club of California.
The Warburg Institute Library holds about 350,000 books. It was originally founded in Hamburg by Aby Warburg (1866-1929), one of the most brilliant intellectuals of the 20th century. Warburg's enormous collection – which documents the history of the Renaissance and the influence of antiquity on modern culture in an interdisciplinary approach - was transformed into a scholarly institution called Kulturwissenschaftliche Bibliothek Warburg. The library was located in Hamburg (Germany) until the year 1933. Four years after Aby Warburg's death his collection had to be brought out of the country because it was in danger of being destroyed by the Nazis. The Kulturwissenschaftliche Bibliothek Warburg was relocated in London, 1944 it became associated with the University of London, and in 1994 it became a founding institute of the University of London's School of Advanced Study.
It was a beautiful morning, one of the last fine days of the summer, with trees just beginning to turn the corner toward the explosion of colors that precede winter's monotone. But instead of going into the woods, where I know the swamp maples along the brook are already flashing their pinks and deeper reds, I got in my car and drove to Paper Town.
We went to the Grand Palais this June to enjoy the fair, buy some books and see old and new friends. The Grand Palais near the Arc de Triomphe is very spacious compared to the previous location of the fair at the Maison de la Mutualité in the Latin Quarter. There were many French dealers of course, but there seemed to be fewer dealers from other countries this year as compared to a few years before.
"Book fairs are fun and you learn a lot, but they do make your feet hurt!" As every year, Frank Werner of Brockhaus/Antiquarium exhibited at the International Antiquarian Book Fair in London. But this year was different. The book fair took place in the bigger and most beautiful National Hall at Olympia, and Frank Werner was accompanied by his aunt. It was the first book fair for Tante Trude, as he calls her, and she was excited!
Despite astonishing and terrifying the world with his lightning manoeuvres and remorseless expenditure of human lives, Napoleon and Republican France were ultimately crushed. Exhausted by constant total warfare rather than strategically defeated on the battlefield, Napoleon left France economically ravished and decisively toppled from its position as the most powerful European nation. Thus this final battle, Waterloo, is rightly regarded as one of the most pivotal moments in Modern British history, ushering in a century of rapid economic and colonial expansion, and global naval domination. It is perhaps no coincidence then that our recent post-colonial age has seen these wars and their principle players romanticised by novelists such as Bernard Cornwell, Patrick O'Brian, C. S. Forester, and Douglas Reeman. These patriotic pseudo-historical accounts, often based on extensive research, present the British armed forces at their best – fighting as heroic under-dogs for the last time while saving the rest of Europe from French Republican autocracy. Cornwell's creation, the Richard Sharpe series, is perhaps the most interesting of these, since the eponymous protagonist manages to be present not only at most of the important battles of the Peninsula War in Portugal and Spain, but also at the Siege of Copenhagen, the naval battle of Trafalgar, and of course the coup de grace, Waterloo.
Here's an interesting idea for a private library: collect nothing but titles that have been penned by prisoners. If you think such a book collection might contain mostly accounts of prison life, think again ... some of the world's greatest, as well as some of the most influential, literature ever written was penned by prisoners.
