Blame it on the Beatles

Posted on November 12, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

“But no matter what one might think about the Beatles or the Animals or the Mindbenders, the results are the same – a generation of young people with sick minds, loose morals, and little desire or ability to defend themselves from those who would bury them. In conclusion it seems rather evident to this writer that the communists have a master music plan for all age brackets of American youth. We know from documented proof that such is the case for babies, one and two year olds with their rhythmic music; we know such is the case for school children with their rhythmic music and for university students with their folk music. What but rock and roll fits the teenager?”

I’ve seen images of the book cover for “Communism, Hypnotism and and the Beatles: An Analysis of the Communist use of Music -The Communist Master Music Plan” by Rev. David A. Noebel, 1965.  online for years and thought it was a joke, but here it is.

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Cats on the Page

Posted on November 11, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

Later this month, the British Library in London will launch a new exhibition celebrating fictional felines. “Cats on the Page” will open on November 23 in the main entrance hall and run through March 17, 2019.

CARROLL: LOOKING GLASS.
Alice’s kitten, Dinah, playing with a ball of yarn. Wood engraving after Sir John Tenniel for the first edition of Lewis Carroll’s ‘Through the Looking Glass,’ 1872.

The free show was scheduled to coincide with the 80th anniversary of T.S. Eliot’s Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, which inspired the long-running musical Cats. Many of the manuscripts, books, illustrations, and art works will be on public display for the first time.

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Follow The North Star

Posted on November 10, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

Last week, civil rights activist and progressive journalist Shaun King announced that he will be resurrecting the North Star, the abolitionist newspaper started by Frederick Douglass and Martin Delany 171 years ago, after receiving legal permission and a blessing from Douglass’ family.

King wrote:

In 1847, with slavery still in full force, two brave men, Frederick Douglass and Martin Delany (both pictured above), started an abolitionist newspaper called The North Star — named for the star, Polaris, that was often used as a guide for those seeking freedom in the North.

Douglass and Delany knew then, as we know now, that in order to fight back against injustice, their stories had to not only be well told — with the color and dimension and nuance that was frequently missing elsewhere, they knew they needed a newspaper that represented the cause of liberation with urgency, clarity, heart, and soul…

While The North Star was originally a print newspaper, we will be launching a news app, a full news website, a collection of podcasts, and an online nightly news broadcast. We’re not just here to change the news — we aim to change the world.

King, with his friend Ben Dixon, are first gathering 100,000 people to assist in their November 15 launch through BuildingTheNorthStar.com.

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America’s 50 Favorite Bookstores

Posted on November 9, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

Using data and reviews from Yelp (plus a little trickery) the website Hoodline has created a list of what they purport to be “America’s 50 Favorite Bookstores”. As you might expect, the the findings include some perennial top picks for bookshops, such as Powell’s City of Books in Portland, Strand in New York City, Tattered Cover Book Store in Denver, and Elliott Bay Book Company in Seattle. I was, however, happily surprised to see some of my personal go-to bookshops make the list as well. Great choices such as Malaprop’s Bookstore and Battery Park Book Exchange in Asheville, Housing Works Bookstore and MacNally Jackson in NYC, and City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco.

Here’s the entire list of 50 favorites and a link to the website for the full story:

  1. Powell’s City of Books (Portland, Oregon)
  2. Wild Rumpus (Minneapolis, Minnesota)
  3. Strand Bookstore (New York City, New York)
  4. Book Loft of German Village (Columbus, Ohio)
  5. Indy Reads Bookstore (Indianapolis, Indiana)
  6. Falling Rock Cafe and Book Store (Munising, Michigan)
  7. Northshire Bookstore (Manchester Center, Vermont)
  8. Taylor Books (Charleston, West Virginia)
  9. Tattered Cover Book Store (Denver, Colorado)
  10. Battery Park Book Exchange & Champagne Bar (Asheville, North Carolina)
  11. Kinokuniya (New York City, New York)
  12. Church Street Coffee and Books (Birmingham, Alabama)
  13. Half Price Books (Dallas, Texas)
  14. Housing Works Bookstore Café (New York City, New York)
  15. The Last Bookstore (Los Angeles, California)
  16. Brookline Booksmith (Brookline, Massachusetts)
  17. John K. King Books (Detroit, Michigan)
  18. Prairie Lights Books (Iowa City, Iowa)
  19. Green Apple Books (San Francisco, California)
  20. The Elliott Bay Book Company (Seattle, Washington)
  21. Magers & Quinn Booksellers (Minneapolis, Minnesota)
  22. McNally Jackson (New York City, New York)
  23. Loganberry Books (Shaker Heights, Ohio)
  24. Malaprop’s Bookstore/Cafe (Asheville, North Carolina)
  25. Issues (Oakland, California)
  26. Harvard Book Store (Cambridge, Massachusetts)
  27. Crazy Wisdom Bookstore & Tea Room (Ann Arbor, Michigan)
  28. Left Bank Books (Saint Louis, Missouri)
  29. Joseph-Beth Booksellers (Lexington, Kentucky)
  30. Indigo Bridge Books and Cafe (Lincoln, Nebraska)
  31. Full Circle Bookstore (Oklahoma City, Oklahoma)
  32. Trident Booksellers & Café (Boston, Massachusetts)
  33. Square Books (Oxford, Mississippi)
  34. Tattered Cover Book Store (Denver, Colorado)
  35. Borderlands Books (San Francisco, California)
  36. Dickson Street Bookshop (Fayetteville, Arkansas)
  37. Downtown Books Bought & Sold (Milwaukee, Wisconsin)
  38. Portsmouth Book and Bar (Portsmouth, New Hampshire)
  39. Night Heron Books & Coffee Shop (Laramie, Wyoming)
  40. Thunderbolt Spiritual Books (Santa Monica, California)
  41. Roebling Point Books and Coffee (Covington, Kentucky)
  42. Books and Brews (Hurricane, West Virginia)
  43. City Lights Bookstore (San Francisco, California)
  44. Birchbark Books & Native Arts (Minneapolis, Minnesota)
  45. Changing Hands Bookstore (Tempe, Arizona)
  46. Unabridged Books (Chicago, Illinois)
  47. Quimby’s Bookstore (Chicago, Illinois)
  48. Lorelei Books (Vicksburg, Mississippi)
  49. Blue Manatee (Cincinnati, Ohio)
  50. Vroman’s Bookstore (Pasadena, California)

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Love Your Bookstore

Posted on November 8, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

This week marks the launch of Love Your Bookstore, “the first and only retail holiday that celebrates all brick-and-mortar bookstores during the holiday season.” The event, which runs from November 10 through November 16, features the Love Your Bookstore Challenge. Book buyers go into a bookstore and “take a picture of the book you are most excited to gift this holiday season or a book you love or want to receive”–or a picture with a local indie bookseller. Pictures should then be posted on Instagram or Twitter with the hashtag #loveyourbookstore. The participants who post will be entered to win “bookish prizes” and are encouraged to challenge three to five friends to “go love their favorite bookstores too.”

One of the Love Your Bookstore organizers, Dominique Raccah, publisher and CEO of Sourcebooks, said last week that the response has been “overwhelmingly inspiring” and includes a range of partners “signing up every single day.”

On its website, the campaign wrote: “As a booklover, bookstores have shaped you, whether you were a child learning to read or an adult looking for connections through the written word. We want to celebrate bookstores from coast to coast because we know that booklovers are in every city in the country. From Kodiak to Key West, from Seattle to Sarasota, there are readers everywhere! Celebrate your favorite bookstore by posting a photo from inside the store with a favorite book (or bookseller!) and use #loveyourbookstore in the caption to share the love!”

You can find more information and materials at Love Your Bookstore’s website.

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Seeing Philadelphia in 1845

Posted on November 7, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

 Philadelphia: City Sights for Little Folks features illustrations of things you could expect to see on a journey through town in 1845. The title, which offers brief descriptions and occasional rhymes, was surprisingly written for children. The book was printed via stereotype, a  method of printing  developed in the 18th century to keep up with the rapidly rising demand for books.  With traditional handset type, printers ran into issues when numerous copies of the same text were needed in quick succession.  With movable, hand-set type the compositor had to arrange each word letter-by-letter on the press bed; when dealing with multiple machines running the same text, this method leaves room for lots of errors, and also requires huge volumes of standing type.  A stereotype is a metal cast of multiple forms of type, which can then be used on a press instead of a hand-assembled form.  That way, printers could use several stereotypes to print the same text quickly, without a huge need for more inventory or staff. Thus, this book is an interesting window into history.  It provides a child’s-eye view of Philadelphia in the mid-19th century, and also embodies a printing technology that was very popular and significant at the time.

 

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Analysis of the Memoir

Posted on November 6, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

h/t Tom Gauld

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Word on the street : VOTE

Posted on November 5, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

This past week street artist Joe Boruchow has been encouraging Philadelphia residents to get out the vote with wheatpastes around town.

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Read More Books

Posted on November 4, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

“A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic,” the cosmologist Carl Sagan once said. “It’s a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of funny dark squiggles. But one glance at it and you’re inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years.”

 

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Bookstore Tourism : Vancouver

Posted on November 3, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

I haven’t spent as much time as I’d like in Vancouver, but the last time that I passed through I managed to pop-in at some of the city’s best bookstores. Fortunately, Travel Between The Pages follower Markus H. sent us a post on some of his favorite literary haunts.

Macleod’s Books on West Pender Street is a labyrinthine treasure trove for book lovers in downtown Vancouver. There are thousands of secondhand, collectible, and antiquarian titles literary spilling off the crowded shelves and piled everywhere throughout the packed bookshop. If you go, be prepared to devote hours to browsing.

Kestrel Books is a beloved community institution in beautiful laid-back Kitsilano that stocks everything from “Archie comics to medieval manuscripts” and more. When you visit, you will know why it has been named the “Best used Bookstore” in Vancouver more than once. Be sure to say hi to Ruby the bookstore cat.

Just up the street from Kestrel. Banyen Books and Sound has been the place to go in Vancouver for books on spirituality, philosophy, religion, music, and art for nearly 50 years.

Tanglewood Books is another Kitsilano favorite for secondhand and hard to find out-of-print titles. There’s a great selection in every imaginable genre from art to zoology. You’ll quickly see why it has been a “Best in Vancouver” winner.

Canterbury Tales Bookstore has been a fixture in East Vancouver’s Drive community for more than 20 years. It’s a great choice for used books, but they also offer all new titles at a 30% discount. If Canterbury Tales doesn’t have what you’re looking for, they will order any title and still give you 30% off list.

The Paper Hound has only been around for about five years, but it has quickly built a devoted following due to the well curated selection of new, used, and collectible books. They are open daily in the heart of downtown.

Spartacus Books is a collectively run, politically oriented shop that focuses on progressive reading material and environmental action. Largely staffed by dedicated volunteers, the bookstore has a surprisingly good selection of titles on politics, art, philosophy, gender issues, poetry, and ecology. It’s a good place to find magazines and journals, and also to meet like-minded locals.

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