If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ by clicking the link above. You may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below. |
|
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
#11
|
|||
|
|||
Building a library...
|
Ads |
#12
|
|||
|
|||
Building a library...
On Mon, 10 Apr 2006 14:35:17 -0700, eurosnob wrote:
Well, it's a done deal - I've closed on my first house, tiny though it may be, complete with a nice wood-paneled study with built-in barrister bookshelves. My law books will of course occupy some of these, but all work and no play -- you know the rest. Why would you even have paper law books? However, I was also raised to believe that Mont Blanc was the end-all-be-all in writing instruments, and I've since come to know that, at least for my tastes, I can get twice the writing instrument in, say, a Pelikan, at half the price. I'd like to correct, if and as necessary, my knowledge of the book world, along those same lines. I'd like to start building a personal library. I'd love to find books that are attractive to shelve and high quality, but still readable. I need to replace my dog-eared paperback and battered hardcover editions (refugees from academia -- and wearing the battle scars of academic carelessness and poverty -- all) of the classics (Shakespeare, Proust, &c.), and beyond. I honestly don't really care about their value as collectable items, so perhaps I'm posting in the wrong place (if so, please direct me to where I ought to be?). Like pens, automobiles, and wine, I seek Quality, but Quality to use and enjoy, actively yet respectfully. In that vein, are Easton Press titles worthwhile purchases (not investments)? Or are there other, "Pelikan"-esque publishers out there that I would be better off investigating? It sounds like you're torn between the superficial and the substantive. Let's face it. There is nothing practical about a fountain pen. They leak, The ink soaks through the paper. You have to wait for it to dry or blow on it. A 39 cent Bic is far more practical, although I prefer disposable mechanical pencils. Books are just information technology. I can understand the trophy mentality. I've been guilty of it. Then I ran out of room. I finally decided that if the book was only text I could get rid of it and keep an electronic version. So, if all you want to do is impress the Joneses go with the cardboard boxes. -- Mark Healey marknews(at)healeyonline(dot)com |
#13
|
|||
|
|||
Building a library...
It sounds like you're torn between the superficial and the substantive.
Let's face it. There is nothing practical about a fountain pen. They leak, The ink soaks through the paper. You have to wait for it to dry or blow on it. A 39 cent Bic is far more practical, You can write better and with less strain using a fountain pen, and it's more fun doing it. A rollerball/gel-pen is not very different in pressure, but gives you only a fixed-width line. A chisel-edge felt-tip gives you the variable width, but goes fuzzy very fast. I do calligraphic labels for the more expensive items in our shop - works very well at selling them and it's a hell of a lot quicker than using a computer. At present I'm using different sizes of broad-nib fountain pen, but I'm thinking of moving to either a dip pen (which I've used before) or quills and reeds (new to me, but I can see why serious calligraphers use them). although I prefer disposable mechanical pencils. Okay if you like writing in thin-line removable grey. I find pencil kind of depressing. Are "indelible" pencils still available anywhere? They used them when I was a kid for applications where erasing was illegal, like account books and voting slips. They used some kind of purple dye which produced a gross-looking smudge if you tried to erase it. They also stained your fingers purple. ============== j-c ====== @ ====== purr . demon . co . uk ============== Jack Campin: 11 Third St, Newtongrange EH22 4PU, Scotland | tel 0131 660 4760 http://www.purr.demon.co.uk/jack/ for CD-ROMs and free | fax 0870 0554 975 stuff: Scottish music, food intolerance, & Mac logic fonts | mob 07800 739 557 |
#14
|
|||
|
|||
Building a library...
"Mark Healey" wrote in message news Why would you even have paper law books? Because when clients walk into your office they can't see your subscription to Lexis. A wall of books is worth about $75 per hour. However, I was also raised to believe that Mont Blanc was the end-all-be-all in writing instruments, and I've since come to know that, at least for my tastes, I can get twice the writing instrument in, say, a Pelikan, at half the price. I'd like to correct, if and as necessary, my knowledge of the book world, along those same lines. I'd like to start building a personal library. I'd love to find books that are attractive to shelve and high quality, but still readable. I need to replace my dog-eared paperback and battered hardcover editions (refugees from academia -- and wearing the battle scars of academic carelessness and poverty -- all) of the classics (Shakespeare, Proust, &c.), and beyond. I honestly don't really care about their value as collectable items, so perhaps I'm posting in the wrong place (if so, please direct me to where I ought to be?). Like pens, automobiles, and wine, I seek Quality, but Quality to use and enjoy, actively yet respectfully. In that vein, are Easton Press titles worthwhile purchases (not investments)? Or are there other, "Pelikan"-esque publishers out there that I would be better off investigating? It sounds like you're torn between the superficial and the substantive. Let's face it. There is nothing practical about a fountain pen. They leak, The ink soaks through the paper. You have to wait for it to dry or blow on it. A 39 cent Bic is far more practical, although I prefer disposable mechanical pencils. Books are just information technology. I can understand the trophy mentality. I've been guilty of it. Then I ran out of room. I finally decided that if the book was only text I could get rid of it and keep an electronic version. So, if all you want to do is impress the Joneses go with the cardboard boxes. -- Mark Healey marknews(at)healeyonline(dot)com |
#15
|
|||
|
|||
Building a library...
Ted Jones wrote:
Beware the Harvard Classics. Most editions have tiny bad typography,.soporific even if the basic volume is not. Baware P.F. Collier, It's editions tend to be undistinguished. If you wanted the HC, I'd go with Easton Press. (Gasp) Ah. Again, many thanks; most (all?) of the sets I've idly come across have been indeed been P.F. Collier... Bicycle? Los Angeles?? Berkely, Boalt, Stanford, UCLA,? (I have money riding on this.) Lightspeed or Trek? Heh. Actually, for all my quasi-pretentious upbringing, I've been on my own since my teenage years. Worked my way through the University of Redlands, and then Southwestern University School of Law's evening program. (I commuted on a motorcycle then.) My bicycles are both Specialized, one for commuting, one for longer distances on the weekends. Don't take to heart the crack about law books. If it's West, the case law books are a bit tacky, but the commentaries are quite handsome. Those aren't so much for show, as they are (believe it or not, even in this day of LexisNexis) handy references, and represent a big chunk and major event of my life (law school). Whether or not they're prestigious, they're going into my study's bookshelves. Only a tiny handful are West, and I agree they're not much to look at (neither are the Aspen titles). The Lexis and Foundation Press titles I actually find rather attractive, but I'm biased. It is quite clear your objective is collecting good books that you dare read. Precisely. I quite understand your doubts about an all Easton Library. It does have a sort of pretentious Book of the Month Club feeling about it. A second problem, do you intend to invite senior partners over? If you do, and one of them happens to know books, you may be put on the Easton track. Heh. While I would certainly hope my taste in books doesn't dictate my career trajectory, you've managed to capture the very essence of my Easton concern; it's, again, right up there with writing and Mont Blanc. If you don't know any better, you think you're getting a great pen for $300 -- you must be, 'cause it's a $300 pen, and it's sold through a high end store at the Beverly Center. But truth be told, I've found Rotrings have better cartridges... Anyone who "knows pens" knows you were taken. My best call, if you have sufficient funds, is to find a dealer who traffics in your preferred books. That's a pretty universal recommendation for "a dealer." Anyone recommend any good dealers in Los Angeles, preferably "Mid City West," Beverly Hills, Century City or adjacant thereto? There is a book shop in Covina A long way away, I know (every much so longer by bicycle) If Metrolink goes there, you could perhaps do briefs on your laptop. For the record, I actually do own a car. (Also a diamond in the rough; it gets comments and questions everywhere from afficionados, and has roughly the same exclusivity -- if not prestige -- as the Ferrari F360, though like models -- mine's not for sale -- sell for about what a nicely loaded Corolla would set you back.) I just tend not to drive it, unless I have to. I keep several suits at the office (there's a dry cleaners on the first level of the parking garage), and enjoy keeping in some semblance of shape on the bicycle as I enjoy the westside's weather. (You might infer that, lacking time to go book hunting, I also lack time to hit the gym; you'd be correct. Hence, bicycle commuting. An easy compromise.) I'll post his address and phone number. Please. Don't suppose you know if the store keeps weekend hours? Another reason why you may wish to step away from Easton, you may be bitten by the bug. Once you have tasted really fine books, you may find you want better and better editions, Then, your Eastons will taste like salt. Also a concern. (My mom and I have a painfully humorous story about a trip we took, before I had started to explore wine meaningfully, where we paid, if I recall correctly, $22/bottle for two bottles of Beringer white zinfandel at a restaurant in Miami's South Beach. I look back and laugh, now, but...) All in all, Eastons are cool books. Franklins are really nice. If you can tolerate multicolor bindings, check out the Folio Society. They are very nice books at a decent price and a good introductory rate. They are often dirt cheap on e-bay. Which of the above, if any, would an asprining home librarian add to his collection today, with money not tight but not flowing in deep rivers, and not feel like he was a rank amateur when he bought them, ten years later? p,s, If you used multi colored underlining or highlighting, glue thos books shut. My bet is you didn't. Books I bought new escaped the highlighter and the pen. (Occasionally, some penciled notes.) Books bought used were often not so lucky, though I did try to find the cleanest volumes where I could. Of course, most (actually, from law school, all) of the used books were paperback. For some reason I couldn't justify the high cost of paperback books new, whereas I had no problem justifying the (somewhat higher) new cost of hardback volumes... Almost all my law books survived pretty much unscathed, except Cases and Materials in Contract Law, which has a pretty chewed up spine. Wonder what that says, if anything. ========= Mark Healey wrote: It sounds like you're torn between the superficial and the substantive. Let's face it. There is nothing practical about a fountain pen. They leak, The ink soaks through the paper. You have to wait for it to dry or blow on it. A 39 cent Bic is far more practical, although I prefer disposable mechanical pencils. Au contraire. Fountain pens write with basically no pressure, can be refilled quickly and inexpensively (I keep a couple of bottles of Quink blue-black around), and if you use the right ink (again, I'm a fan of Quink, but I've also had good luck with Waterman's ink), dries very quickly -- faster than the gel and (disposable) roller ball pens I've used. I injured my right (dominant) hand in a motorcycle accident several years ago, and I can write for an hour or so with a fountain pen. Anything else, I'm worthless after 5-10 minutes. Books are just information technology. I can understand the trophy mentality. I've been guilty of it. Then I ran out of room. I finally decided that if the book was only text I could get rid of it and keep an electronic version. Quick reference texts, I'll agree with you, to a point. But even with O'Reilly's Safari and PDF versions of texts and documents, I find I the stuff out for easier reading. (And that's true even with my 22" widescreen cinema display, which allows me to have a full-page-width PDF window open alongside a Word document.) The ease of doing a Boolean search to quickly locate just the paragraph or table you're looking for more than cancels out staring at the text on the screen. But for *reading*, for sitting down with a good book in a comfortable chair with a reading light, to drill into the text with single-minded determination or for the casual release of the day (Gibson and Stephenson are my favorites for the latter; before law school, I was a computer geek), nothing beats paper and ink. And if you're going to have them around anyway, hardcovers don't take up that much more space than paperbacks, and survive much better. So, if all you want to do is impress the Joneses go with the cardboard boxes. Enough of that. Seriously. |
#16
|
|||
|
|||
Building a library...
John R. Yamamoto-Wilson wrote: rennick wrote: If you don't intend to invest, then why bother? Um, to read? Since even those who buy "collectible" books are unwise to consider them merely an investment I would consider that a rather strange question. This is something we have discussed again and again and no doubt will continue to discuss. "Investment" means different things to different people. From one standpoint, Easton Press books are an excellent investment because they hold their value. With so much new fiction, self-help and other books, you can find a vast number of "used like new" copies on Amazon for anywhere from one cent to three or four dollars. (Plus $3.49 for shipping, of course.) Yes, new Eastons generally cost considerably more than books in those categories, but even when you look at "used, like new" Eastons on ADDALL and compare the price drops of Easton as a percentage contrasted with the price dropping of, say, most 1998 Random House novels, you will see that Eastons are a solid investment as far as holding their value in "used, like new" or "used, near fine" very well. On the other hand, you don't buy an Easton new for $100 with the hope of selling it for $500 or $1,000. A tiny percentage of them have taken off like that for one reason or another, but only an idiot would bank on that. So, an Easton is a good investment if you mean something that can be sold later for at least a significant percentage of its original price is a good investment. y own preference, for the "classics", would be nicely-bound volumes, as old as possible, without being firsts. For instance, I passed up the opportunity to inherit my father's set of Dickens (early 20th century, clothbound, but very attractive and in pristine condition) because the print was rather too tiny, and am now on the lookout for a similar set with decent-sized print. Some good illustrations would be a bonus, but not strictly necessary and, unlike a lot of people, who go for leather bindings, Yes, and some of those jackanapes don't know a damnable SKIVER (spit) when they touch it and pay far too much just because a book is leatherbound. I would be just as happy with a good clothbound set. I agree. For my money, when you are talking about classics, it is hard to beat many Heritages when they are in fine condition. One comment on age, though. What some posters to this group have a hard time grasping is that the overall quality of the book can be far more significant that its age. For instance, in the 1890's Hearst and others pubished a huge number of classic reprints, including Dickens and many others. These were cheap books in all respects. Cheap paper, cheap cloth, etc. with often one very mediocre frontispiece illustration. I would not not give you twenty bucks for a box of 'em. For the most part, they are cheap lousy miserable books with tiny font-sizes to boot. Contrast those with the beautiful Scribner classics (and some of the other classics by McKay and others) from WW 1 vintage into, say, the Twenties. Now THOSE are books... [from the upstdairs office] |
#17
|
|||
|
|||
Building a library...
wrote in message
oups.com... Ted Jones wrote: All in all, Eastons are cool books. Franklins are really nice. If you can tolerate multicolor bindings, check out the Folio Society. They are very nice books at a decent price and a good introductory rate. They are often dirt cheap on e-bay. Which of the above, if any, would an asprining home librarian add to his collection today, with money not tight but not flowing in deep 1. Discussion to date seems to omit current preferences, e.g. the OP did not say he read mostly fiction, non-fiction, 19th century etc. In time most of us tend to specialize (e.g. Trollope, fly fishing, India, poetry). E.g. I am currently searching for attractive hard covers to replace student-life paperbacks since reread to destruction (e.g. Natural History of Selborne, Aubrey's Brief Lives, memoirs of John Masters and Fitzroy Maclean.) 2. Folio Society selections of 1955-1990 would constitute a first-class unspecialized library of lasting value both literary and material. I should look carefully and twice at special offers offered to the American market by FS in the last 10 or 20 years. -- Don Phillipson Carlsbad Springs (Ottawa, Canada) |
#18
|
|||
|
|||
Building a library...
|
#19
|
|||
|
|||
Building a library...
|
#20
|
|||
|
|||
Building a library...
wrote in message oups.com... Here is one interesting thing I left out in Don't underestimate yourself blip. You left out a lot of interesting things. |
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
rec.collecting.books FAQ | Hardy-Boys.net | Books | 0 | May 9th 04 08:39 PM |
[FAQ] rec.collecting.books FAQ | Mike Berro | Books | 0 | December 26th 03 08:18 PM |
PR: ANA Library Officially Dedicated in Honor of Dwight N. Manley | ANA | Paper Money | 0 | October 14th 03 11:25 PM |
PR: ANA Library Officially Dedicated in Honor of Dwight N. Manley | ANA | Coins | 0 | October 14th 03 11:24 PM |
PR: ANA Library Officially Dedicated in Honor of Dwight N. Manley | Susan Nulty | Coins | 0 | October 14th 03 08:17 PM |