"Think of yourself as dead. You have lived your life. Now take what's left and live it properly."
— Marcus Aurelius
So this is Xmas And what have you done Another year over And a new one just begun And so this is Xmas I hope you have fun The near and the dear one The old and the young A Very Merry Xmas And a Happy New Year Lets hope it’s a good one Without any fear
Apple is like a ship. That ship is loaded with treasure, but there's a hole in the ship. And my job is to get everyone to row in the same direction
Did Jewish agents, editors, and writers mostly promote other Jews? Hardly. They were too busy tearing each other down writers »
Of Course the Feds Were All Over TwitterThe American Conservative. The deck: “Twitter was staffed by craven functionaries eager to please contacts and former colleagues in the national security state.”
We’re drowning in old books. But getting rid of them is heartbreaking
Washington Post: “…America is saturated with old books, congesting Ikea Billy cases, Jengaing atop floors, Babeling bedside tables.
During months of quarantine, book lovers faced all those spines and opportunities for multiple seasons of spring cleaning. They adore these books, irrationally, unconditionally, but know that, ultimately, if they don’t decide which to keep, it will be left to others to unceremoniously dump them. So, despite denial, grief, bargaining, anguish and even nausea, the Great Deaccession commenced…”
This is the most material flooding onto the market that I’ve ever seen,” says veteran Vancouver, Wash., dealer KolShaver, a sentiment shared by sellers across the country.
For dealers who survived the pandemic, “the used-book business has never been healthier,” says Wonder Book owner Chuck Roberts, a 42-year veteran in the trade, strolling through his three-acre warehouse, a veritable biblio wonderland, jammed with volumes ranging from never-been-cracked publishers’ overstock to centuries-old classics bound in leather. “We take everything and pretty much what no one else is going to take,” Roberts says, which is how his business accumulated an inventory of 6 million, with 300,000 more new used books arriving every month. Wonder Book practices “nose-to-tail bookselling,” meaning a home or use is found for each item one way or the other through multiple websites (national and international), three bricks-and-mortar stores, and school and charitable donations. Wonder Book’s damaged items on life support are pulped to produce 100,000 pounds monthly of recycled paper.” [I have a drop-off pick-up relationship with this place / no ebooks for me!]
What were the best books of 2022? The lists are here... The New York Times... Washington Post... New Yorker... The Atlantic... Guardian... Slate... Economist... New Statesmen... The White Review... Public Books... more »
Articles of Note
Flip open the last issue of Bookforum. This is not a dying magazine. So why is it closing? bookforum»
New Books
For the Victorians, progress was “natural and built into the order of things.” The “technoscience”they promoted is with us still Victorians»
Essays & Opinions
Justin E.H. Smith, well into midlife, has had his last swallow of alcohol. That particular search for transcendence is over midlife »