What does it mean to place one book next to another? What connections does this kind of piling up suggest? My shelves are usually (a) quite messy, and (b) a register of sequence. Here is a recent pile on a shelf whose verticality tracks what I read, in order, for some of 2019-20.
Wang Qingsong’s "Follow Him" looks remarkably like Aardvark Books in Brampton Bryant, a mandatory visit we make on our annual Easter trip to the Welsh Marches, as we did this last week, this time masked and wearing the supplied surgical gloves. Which would probably be a good idea in most second-hand bookshops at most times, now I come to think of it.
I miss the old Thornton's Bookshop on Broad Street, where treasure could be excavated from filthy cardboard boxes stowed beneath the staircases, still priced in shillings and pence. That was a *proper* bookshop, straight out of central casting.
And aren't those IKEA Billy bookshelves in the Clifford triptych? Apparently a set has been sold every second since the Reformation.
Interesting that the labelling of Clifford’s books is a constant in all three panels. Labels appear on the books turned fore-edge out and, on those shelved spine out, always at the top of the spine. Even more interesting that, among the third panel’s jumbled books, the labels appear on the bottom or top edge of books turned spine down. Is that the painter’s doing or Clifford’s? Were the labels folded pieces of paper not glued down but movable to show, depending on how the book was shelved? If so, and if it was Clifford’s doing, what a personality to insist on order within her disorder. Two more sites for bookshelf sightings: https://www.onthebookshelf.co.uk and https://bookpatrol.net/?s=bookshelf. Cheers, Robert
Wang Qingsong’s "Follow Him" looks remarkably like Aardvark Books in Brampton Bryant, a mandatory visit we make on our annual Easter trip to the Welsh Marches, as we did this last week, this time masked and wearing the supplied surgical gloves. Which would probably be a good idea in most second-hand bookshops at most times, now I come to think of it.
I miss the old Thornton's Bookshop on Broad Street, where treasure could be excavated from filthy cardboard boxes stowed beneath the staircases, still priced in shillings and pence. That was a *proper* bookshop, straight out of central casting.
And aren't those IKEA Billy bookshelves in the Clifford triptych? Apparently a set has been sold every second since the Reformation.
Mike
Interesting that the labelling of Clifford’s books is a constant in all three panels. Labels appear on the books turned fore-edge out and, on those shelved spine out, always at the top of the spine. Even more interesting that, among the third panel’s jumbled books, the labels appear on the bottom or top edge of books turned spine down. Is that the painter’s doing or Clifford’s? Were the labels folded pieces of paper not glued down but movable to show, depending on how the book was shelved? If so, and if it was Clifford’s doing, what a personality to insist on order within her disorder. Two more sites for bookshelf sightings: https://www.onthebookshelf.co.uk and https://bookpatrol.net/?s=bookshelf. Cheers, Robert