Thoughts and experiences of those tactile, lasting, beautiful, timeless objects called ‘books’, including their ownership, production, sale, theft and loss. See also our sister page on book design and illustration, here.
Now we are six
As we approach the 6th birthday of WritingRedux, I've cast my mind back to the year I turned six and the books I was given and reading at that time. We had several Christopher Robin books at home and so Now We Are Six was a permanent presence. In addition, in 1970,...
The Magic Ink-Pot
Always on the hunt for treasures among forgotten children's books, I came across this one by chance when I was rather looking at glorious buildings and libraries stashed around the National Trust. It seems The Magic Ink-Pot was born out of a mother writing...
Second hand books
Virginia Woolf's comment on second hand books is for all those of you who love the look and feel of them, the randomness and surprise of finding them in old boxes, or lined up in a charming bookshop. I hope that, like me, you also enjoy second guessing the history of...
Shelebrate with a shelfie
With a nod to the British Library which introduced me to the idea of the 'shelfie', a photo featuring a shelf's worth of books, here is one to celebrate the 5th anniversary of WritingRedux. It features most of the books I've celebrated on WritingRedux over the last...
‘Do you prefer reading to cards?’ said he; ‘that is rather singular’.
Jane Austen –Â Pride & Prejudice
Arthur Ransome – cover illustrations
If you've been following WritingRedux, you may have noticed a number of pawky playful gems from Arthur Ransome's children's books. By now I've read four of the many he wrote,...
Rules and readers
Many of us have been in situations where vague ‘conventions’ are cited, the unwritten rules governing this or that realm. Sometimes I have sensed that ‘convention’ was a fig-leaf for...
Wishing you a happy jólabókaflóð!
This lovely word is Icelandic for 'Christmas book flood'. As you may know, Iceland is home to the world's most committed readers and it has long been a tradition to...
Department of Exceptions
‘All good publishers have a department of exceptions.’
Perhaps any institution worth its salt should have a department of exceptions: schools admissions offices, human resources departments, government ministries.
Trouble is,...
A capacious book thief
Steinbeck and Robert Capa spent a month in the Soviet Union. It took some time for Steinbeck to cotton on to the fact that his travelling companion was a closet...
Book as mirror I
A great riposte, of course, and true to a large extent. Having dismissed a book, it sometimes happens that I come back to it later, even decades later, and wonder...
The Magic Ink-Pot
Always on the hunt for treasures among forgotten children's books, I came across this one by chance when I was rather looking at glorious buildings and libraries stashed around the...
On the culling of books
I have long put off writing this post because I have an aversion to it. Â A while back I bought a second hand book by Italo Calvino, Six Memos for...
Books hidden, books found
Armenians seemed to be particularly adept at averting bibliocide.  Some cultures, threatened with bibliocide, committed books to memory. The Armenians, apparently successfully committed to memory the whereabouts of hidden books and...
Second hand books
Virginia Woolf's comment on second hand books is for all those of you who love the look and feel of them, the randomness and surprise of finding them in old...
Culling of books …
I sometimes feel like this when we go to the flea market in Geneva and survey a lifetime's worth of books chucked into banana boxes by the house clearance company...
Hoovering up ideas
There's such a zest to this account of the Armenian approach to dealing with invaders: translate everything you can get your hands on, regardless of your relationship with other nations...
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