So, you knew it had to be something extra special to forget about the blog for a second day. And let me tell you, it is special! A couple of weeks ago, at The World Famous Ace of Spades Headquarters Book Thread, a fellow asked for volunteers to proofread crappy old books at Distributed Proofreaders
Human virtues are plants which never strike a deep root unless shaken by misfortune. Virtue consists in the directing of our intellectual and physical energies to a praiseworthy end; but if our energies be naturally feeble, or dwindle and wither away through lack of exercise, our virtue, by a necessary consequence, must become dwarfish and
Hit the link for a photo of T. Boone Picken’s amazing personal library.
I don’t think that you can get a better sense of the sort of meaning than from what is in every bookshop in this city… . Douglas Murry via Powerline
I picked up The Literature of American History: A Bibliographical Guide (1902, reprinted 1966) and was skimming through the section on “Educational History,” and came across these two titles (grabbed screen shots at Archive dot org). Here’s the blurb in The Literature of American History: Together these two works, which are really companions, present a
Looks a lot like the Farm.
June 6, 1944– Tonight’s communiqué just in from D-Day invasion headquarters summarizes the news. “Allied forces,” it says, “have succeeded in their initial landings in France; and fighting continues.” Lowell Thomas was the Walter Cronkite of radio. Beginning in 1930, he broadcast twice each evening on CBS radio. It was said that his voice had
via the Sunday Morning Book thread at Ace of Spades Headquarters What the actual H-E-double toothpicks?
Mr. Big sent me an article yesterday with the subject line “the return of the primitive.” He should have said, “the return of the idiocy.” The article, Cool Your Home Without Air Conditioning, was originally published in Popular Science. It is very much like all other PS articles that I happen upon. Its tone is
Originally posted late June, 2016. This time I’ll use frozen stewed tomatoes and puree them in the blender. Created as a dodge for New York’s Sunday morning liquor laws, this zesty, pick-me-upper has become very popular on the brunch menu at the Rainbow Room. This recipe is from Serve It Cold! A Cookbook of
via Powerline’s The Week in Pictures
Who loves a gardenFinds within his soulLife’s whole;He hears the anthem of the soilWhile ingrates toil;And sees beyond his little sphereThe waving fronds of heaven, clear.– Louise Seymour Jones from The Best Loved Poems of the American People. Hazel Felleman, ed. Garden City Books, Garden City, New York. 1936.
via AoSHQ Sunday Morning Book Thread; Check out the photo of the mirrored library, as well. There’s a 12 volume collection of books for children with My Book House as part of the title: They are beautiful books. Images from Archive.org where you can borrow the books for 14 days. This is interesting– and disconcerting.
Thackeray’s “On a Joke I Once Heard”
Author’s Introduction: Imagine if Homer, Virgil, Dante, Chaucer, and the other great poets of ancient Greece, Rome, and the Middle Ages had been given the gift, not only to peer into the twenty-first century, but to correspond with we who live in that most confusing and rudderless of centuries. Had it been in their power
Let the fragrant summer breeze,And the leaves of locust trees, And the apple-buds and -blossoms, and the wings of honey bees,All palpitate with glee,Till the happy harmonyBrings back each childish joy to you and me from “A Song of Long Ago,” in Riley Farm-Rhymes with Country Pictures by James Whitcomb Riley (1883)
Hope your skies are clear and you’re getting your work done this morning. Grandma Moses, Otto Kallir, Harry N. Abrams, Inc. Publishers, New York, 1973.
via Powerline’s The Week in Pictures Going to be sorting through the books Daughter C & The J-Man left up in the apartment. How many copies of the Iliad and Odyssey do you think are up there?
Oh. It’s become silly alright! Well beyond silly if you ask me.