Book shelves series #38, thirty-eighth Sunday of 2012
The final entry on this corner piece.
What have these volumes in common? They are all aesthetically pleasing.
They are all too tall to fit elsewhere comfortably.
Several issues of McSweeney’s, some art books, and some graphic novels:
I’ve already expressed my strong enthusiasm for Charles Burns’s X’ed Out. The Acme Library pictured is part of Chris Ware’s series, and is beautiful and claustrophobic.
McSweeney’s #28 comprises eight little hardbacked fables that arrange into two “puzzle” covers:
I’ve also written enthusiastically about Max Ernst’s surreal graphic novel, Une Semaine de Bonte:
America’s Great Adventure is this wonderful book that pairs American writing (poems, songs, excerpts from novels and journals) with American paintings to tell a version of American history:
It probably deserves its own review. Short review: It’s a wonderful book if you can find it.
I had never heard of James Lipton’s dictionary of terms of venery, An Exaltation of Larks, or The Venereal Game before I found it wedged between some old etymological dictionaries I was browsing in my favorite book store, but when I picked it up I knew I was going to buy it almost immediately. Part dictionary, part etymology, and part linguistic game, An Exaltation explores those strange collective noncount nouns of English that anglophiles (like me) find so charming and weird. The first part of the book deals with some of the more common terms of venery, like “pride of lions,” or “skulk of foxes”:
But Lipton soon gives over to more esoteric terms, and then eventually plays with outright invention. The book’s illustrations recall Max Ernst’s surrealist graphic novel Une Semaine de Bonté; they also remind me of the recapitations of recent Biblioklept interviewee Click Mort. Anyway, a very cool book, likely a cult favorite, and lots and lots of fun.
Biblioklept 