The book trade magazine Publishers Weekly has named the “Book Business Worker” as person of the year. The wonderful graphic above illustrates just some of the multitudes who keep publishing and bookselling going even in the midst of a world-wide pandemic. You can read the full article explaining the Person of the Year choice here.
During these troubled times, we all need an escape. Here’s Escapista, a collection of slow video for our times. The curated website was created by Brazilian software developer Cristiano Dalbem. Like many savvy slow travelers, he also embraced the concept of Slow TV and since the beginning of the global pandemic he has been collecting YouTube videos that focus on slow travel. So visit Escapista and choose a genre. Then sit back and chill.
According to the Escapista Manifesto:
This is a collection of possibilities to let your mind wander. It is a garden of endless discoveries and pleasant surprises within the safeness of your own backyard.
This is an experience dearly curated by human beings. We swept the World Wide Web to collect only the best adventures. For each video selected, ten other videos weren’t.
This is at the speed of life. And as in life, it doesn’t come with buttons for pausing, fast-forwarding, or skipping. You make a decision regarding which channel to watch and then accept what the universe brings you. Just like in real life.
There are no readymade stories at Escapista, your mind is in charge of creating them instead. It is like a meditative immersion, a background for your life to happen.
If you are a habitué of certain regions of social media, it’s likely that you have stumbled upon the work of Brian Bilston who has been called the “unofficial poet laureate of Twitter” for his clever, digestible, pun-tastic poetry. He recently published a wonderful holiday poem which is a cleverly based on the classic Dickens story A Christmas Carol.
If you follow TBTP on a regular basis you are well aware of my tremendous affection for Iceland and all things Icelandic. One of the most surprising things about the island nation is the love of books and reading. In fact, Iceland prints more books per capita than any other country in the world, with over 50% of Icelanders reading more than eight books per year. One of the country’s most popular Christmas traditions focuses on books as gifts. Jólabókaflóð – loosely translated as ‘Christmas flood of books’ – is a literary Christmas celebration that begins with the printing of the Bókatíðindi book catalog by the Icelandic Publisher’s Association in mid-November and ends with the giving, receiving, and reading of new books on Christmas Eve.
If you are intrigued by Iceland and its traditions, and you’d like to learn more about the magical island and its traditions, check out the marvelous series of books on the country’s culture, traditions, history, and travel by my friend Alda Sigmundsdóttir . Her recent title The Little Book of Tourists in Iceland is a must if you’re thinking of a visit when the pandemic finally ends and The Little Book of Icelanders at Christmas will explain local holiday lore, such as the Yule Lads and the wonderful Jólabókaflóð.
I spent November 2019 in New Zealand and had hoped to be back again this year, but the Covid-19 pandemic ended that notion. Still, I hold out some hope to return to Aotearoa sometime in 2021. In the meantime, New Zealand hopes to inspire some positivity for us all in 2021 with its Forest of Hope campaign.
Tourism New Zealand has invited folks from all over the world to share their disappointments of 2020 online. For every misfortune shared, users are invited to put a positive spin on their situation by donating a tree in the Forest of Hope. This new forest of native trees will represent hope and regrowth for 2021, according to Sarah Handley, general manager for Tourism New Zealand.
“In New Zealand, the Te Reo Māori values of manaaki and tiaki have become incredibly relevant today. Manaaki speaks to the importance of having empathy and tiaki inspires us to care for people and place,” Handley explained. “While our borders remain closed to international visitors, we want to extend a little manaaki and encourage a sense of tiaki to those who are in need of some optimism for the new year.”
Tourism New Zealand has teamed up with New Zealand conservation charity Trees That Count to launch the Forest of Hope initiative, which will plant trees in Queenstown and Northland. People who donate a tree can track their journey on the Trees That Count website. They will also receive an email notification once their trees are planted.
Those interested can share their disappointments from the year on the Tourism New Zealand website.
Hermann Hesse : “This day will never come again and anyone who fails to eat and drink and taste and smell it will never have it offered to him again in all eternity. The sun will never shine as it does today…You must play your part and sing a song, one of your best.”
How to use a medieval bookmark: 1.) Read. 2.) Spin the volvelle to mark where on the page you stopped reading (I-IV correspond to different sections on the page. 3.) Close book. 4.) Repeat as necessary. By the way, the featured book is dated circa 1400 and the featured book mark is also from medieval era.
Travel Between The Pages 