Book whores of the world unite.
I'm a book slut. I'll open my wallet to anyone with an old book to sell, the older the better. I've picked up books that were so filthy and certainly disease-ridden that homeless shelters wouldn't put them on their shelves, and I've taken every single one home with me.
My name is Kickaha, and I'm a used book whore.
So I know y'all are out there, let's share.
Sitting on my desk right now, here at work, is a copy of the Ninth Annual Report of the Smithsonian Institute, 1854. 6000 were printed, I picked this one up for $15. I love this book... the writing is unbelievably full of promise and everything is bright, shiny, and new. There's a report on a survey for a rail line through the Pacific Northwest that hits many points near where I grew up. (And some interesting nomenclature changes. They make mention of a Kallispe Lake in Idaho. There's no such lake. But there is a Kallispell. What do you want to bet someone misread Kallispe L. on a map?) It's 463 pages of every bit of trivia and minutia from the first years of the Smithsonian's existence, including their complete budgetary reports from 1846 onward.
I adore it.
Anyone else want to fess up?
My name is Kickaha, and I'm a used book whore.
So I know y'all are out there, let's share.
Sitting on my desk right now, here at work, is a copy of the Ninth Annual Report of the Smithsonian Institute, 1854. 6000 were printed, I picked this one up for $15. I love this book... the writing is unbelievably full of promise and everything is bright, shiny, and new. There's a report on a survey for a rail line through the Pacific Northwest that hits many points near where I grew up. (And some interesting nomenclature changes. They make mention of a Kallispe Lake in Idaho. There's no such lake. But there is a Kallispell. What do you want to bet someone misread Kallispe L. on a map?) It's 463 pages of every bit of trivia and minutia from the first years of the Smithsonian's existence, including their complete budgetary reports from 1846 onward.
I adore it.
Anyone else want to fess up?
Comments
Originally posted by Kickaha
I'm a book slut. I'll open my wallet to anyone with an old book to sell, the older the better. I've picked up books that were so filthy and certainly disease-ridden that homeless shelters wouldn't put them on their shelves, and I've taken every single one home with me.
My name is Kickaha, and I'm a used book whore.
So I know y'all are out there, let's share.
Holy shit was that funny. Screenshot time.
g
Originally posted by thegelding
click it, you know you want to...
g
It's cute, but it's nowhere near the Mecca.
Originally posted by segovius
Some interesting rare early Dylan Thomas and Charles Fort also somewhere but I can't seem to find them.
That is hilariously ironic.
Hello, MY name is Jubelum, and I, too, am a book whore.
Originally posted by segovius
I think Satanic Verses 1st/mint was 60 quid last time I checked......
How much is it defaced with horns and a tail, though?
last one i bought was Rage, by Stephen King. jumped up in value after columbine. go figure.
Originally posted by Kickaha
I've picked up books that were so filthy and certainly disease-ridden that homeless shelters wouldn't put them on their shelves, and I've taken every single one home with me.
why
Originally posted by Kickaha
It's cute, but it's nowhere near the Mecca.
yeah, but the normals people are my old high school/college/bandmates...plus they have live music and performance art and poetry readings and also cats running around the store...plus, does Powells have Blaster Al Ackerman as an employee??
g
Originally posted by burningwheel
why
whooooooooooooooosh
It show the spirit of great mind of this time, who where deeply racist, even if they discribe them as humanist.
pdoc: One of my favorite books is a science book that was my grandfather's, where it talks about the eight planets, and the indivisibility of the atom.
I also have these old massive issues of The Iron Age from just after WWII. Big presses, engine, generators and whatever else made out of metal all taken apart and explained with an almost child-like enthusiasm, similar to how computers were discussed until recently.
It's also real wild seeing them struggle with issues and ideas that have today been beaten into the ground. Early texts about flying, for instance. Of course, I was looking over the New Horizons (Pluto and Kuiper Belt probe) sites the other day and could see how we are going through some of the stuff they were.
I love those very British "Boy's Own" type books they used to produce where the boys have names like Charles and Algernon and, from a modern perspective at least, it's all very high camp.
I'm still astounded that Marx wrote "The Communist Manifesto" in 1848 and how much of it, if you ignore references to things like the bourgeoisie and telegraph (just substitute corporations and the internet), reads like it was written just yesterday.
But my fave old book would have to be Apsley Cherry-Garrard's "The Worst Journey in the World". In part, it's a recounting of Scott's ill-fated attempt to be the first to reach the South Pole. But the worst journey in the world actually refers to a trip that Cherry-Garrard and two other members of the party made to an Emperor penguin colony the winter before.
These nutcases went wandering about Antarctica in the dead of winter. That's about as insane as you can get. That they survived is nothing short of a miracle. And if you know anything about the breeding cycle of Emperor penguins, you'll understand how right Cherry-Garrard is when he says in the intro "Take it all in all, I do not believe anybody on earth has a worse time than an Emperor penguin."