I just took a wee sanity break and wandered over to the book shop across the street. I see there is now a whole series of Penguins of what might loosely be described as "guilty pleasure" reads of the late 19th and early 20th century with wonderfully retro covers. There is Rider Haggard and Conan-Doyle, Erskine Childers and John Buchan, Anthony ( Read more... )

I haven't done a book illustration post in a while. This time it's Salomé by Oscar Wilde, illustrated with pochoirs by André Derain. Limited Editions Club 1938.

This was a bit of a pig to photograph because it's bound in soft covers and doesn't want to lie flat.

( Three samples under the cut )

I've just finshed Paul Cartledge's Thermopylae; the Battle that Changed the WorldWho would have thought that there was anything new to say about Thermopylae? Cartledge, with his unrivalled understanding of Sparta, not only provides new insight into the Causes and Courses of 481-479 BCE (to riff off Calvocoressi et al) but also does for Thermopylae ( Read more... )

I've been reading books that are rather out of my usual run. One I quite enjoyed was Patricia Highsmith's The Price of Salt which is a 1950s lesbian road trip novel. I liked the writing. I liked the character development but I really do think that 1950s America must have been a desperately dull place to live ( Read more... )

I finished ploughing through War and Peace for, I think, the fourth time on the flight home yesterday. It really is an extremely odd book and one that no publishing company would touch with a twenty verst barge pole today. The story line is interesting enough and I like Tolstoi's take on the the War of 1812. It has the usual problem of novels of ( Read more... )

From ironed_orchidList 10 books you have on your bookshelf that you think nobody else on your friends list has on theirs ( Read more... )

Earlier this year BBC Radio Four broadcast an adaptation of Anthony Powell's A Dance to the Music of Time by one Michael Butt, who appears to have a long track record as a radio dramatist. Now, I don't envy anyone having to condense Dance into six 53 minute episodes but I have to say that Mr. Butt did a bloody awful job ( Read more... )

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The latest Folio Society mailing includes sets of works by Dickens and Hemingway. I would have to work hard to find two authors that lemur_catta and I dislike as much. Hardy perhaps ( Read more... )

Below the cut are nine images of pages from the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite illustrated in pochoir by Walter Bachinski and printed by him at the Shanty Bay Press. Included are three full page hand finished pochoirs.

( The illustrations )