Demystifying Social Media “Social media” may very well be the single most pervasive yet misunderstood term of the last decade. I would be pointing out the obvious to say that over time, social media has fundamentally changed the way we interact; it has also raised the bar for businesses, altered the way we construct communities and discussion, and given birth to some pretty cryptic lingo (be warned: LOL does not mean Lots Of Love). Furthermore, a bewildering number of social media platforms exist, from the mega-networks like Facebook and LinkedIn to media sites like Youtube and Pinterest, and everything in between. And then there are the endless blogs, and tweets, and apps…oh my! Feeling overwhelmed yet? While I think it is safe to say that most booksellers have a website and use the internet for research, buying, and selling, my sense is that there is some lingering hesitation when it comes to using social media as a tool for business. And no small wonder! How does one even get started, let alone navigate all the interfaces and etiquette required across various websites? More importantly, how does one use this new technology effectively? Social media engagement has become such an important aspect to doing business these days that bigger companies will hire people expressly for the purpose of creating content and monitoring their presence across multiple platforms. While that might be necessary for companies with hundreds or thousands of employees, where does that leave... [more THE SAVVY BOOKSELLER: Social Media for the Antiquarian Book Trade Post #1]
Each year the Rare Books and Manuscripts Section (RBMS) of the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) holds a four day Preconference focused on special collections. The location of the conference and the theme change annually; this year the event was held in Las Vegas and explored "space, place, and the artifact in special collections". The conference allows special collections librarians and developers from across the country to socialize and participate in meaningful conversations about the field. In addition to the variety of workshops, seminars, and social events, a main component of the Preconference is the ABAA's Bookseller Showcase (read Greg Gibson's impressions of the 2014 showcase here). The showcase is like a book fair amuse-bouche: there are usually between 30-40 exhibitors who bring a sampling of their inventory, giving attendees a small taste of the type of material they specialize in and what they currently have to offer. Booksellers who participate in the showcase frequently describe it as an invaluable opportunity to meet customers face to face and to forge new relationships with special collections developers. It's worthwhile to note that one does not have to work in special collections to attend the annual Preconfernece. Registration is open to anyone who may want to attend, and many ABAA booksellers have found the Preconference to be a wonderful opportunity to network with librarians and to further educate themselves about the field so they c... [more Viva Las Vegas: 2014 RBMS Preconference and Booksellers’ Showcase]
Printed American broadsides of the 18th and 19th centuries—what we might think of today as “posters”—were an important public means of spreading news and information within a community. A broadside might print a political manifesto, a religious sermon, a military declaration, news of a great battle, or a Presidential proclamation. A broadside might advertise a newly arrived shipment of goods or a new production of a play or circus. Merchants and inventors used broadsides to sell their wares or to attract investors. American broadsides fall under the broader category of historical ephemera—printed items created and intended only for temporary, fleeting use. These ephemeral artifacts documented the beliefs, activities, and concerns of a very specific time and place in American history. Eighteenth and nineteenth century American broadsides were public notices and announcements; mass media in an age where the “worlds” in which men and women lived were much smaller and less connected. From an American broadside circa 1854 printed in Charleston, South Carolina. Illustrated broadsides from 18th and 19th century America are desirable, as are broadsides lettered in color. Unlike a book, a broadside's authorship often was anonymous or obliquely suggested. This broadside from the American Civil War denounces Copperheads, those individuals whom's loyalty to the Union cause was of dubious nature. (Image detail) By the 20th century, printing technologies in America had grown ... [more American Broadsides, History on a Sheet of Paper]
The making of catalogs is on my mind tonight. I just put my own nineteenth catalog to bed — it left for the printer's an hour ago, a massive thing by my standards; over a hundred pages, just shy of two hundred-fifty items, all pictured. Research and cataloguing aside, lots of work goes into a catalog like that. The last two weeks at Lorne Bair Rare Books have been spent frantically photographing, photo-editing, laying-out, and proofreading. None of which I would describe as traditional “booksellerly” vocations — in fact, I'm not sure a single new book has gotten catalogued around here in the interval — but there we are. The New Antiquarian (if I may be so bold) finds himself going to great lengths these days to sell a book. Not that there's anything “new” about rare book catalogs! For a few hundred years they were the standard medium through which antiquarian books were distributed. But then (you've heard this one before) came the internet. Not everyone stopped printing catalogs when on-line bookselling came to prominence, but many did. Those of us who continued putting them out were looked on with a bit of suspicion by some of our more progressive colleagues, as though we weren't quite getting with the program. Now, it seems, there's a bit of a resurgence in printed catalogs — I'm seeing more of them lately, many from dealers new to the scene. Clearly there's something up. I'm not certain exactly how many of my colleagues issue printed catalogues, but I'm cer... [more What My Friends Think I Do: Part II In A Series]
I'm from Maryland and John Waters is my favorite famous hometown boy. (I'm reading his new hitchhiking memoir Carsick now.) I serendipitously met him once at a gallery in P-town and he was just as engaging one-on-one as he is in this video—a recent interview from the LIVE from the NYPL series. Unsurprisingly, Waters is a great story-teller and in it, he talks about his book collection (think counter-culture and LGBT literature with punny titles) and name-checks our friends at Bolerium Books. He also discusses the problems institutions face when collecting material that is no longer "PC" or otherwise considered distasteful. -Susan Benne [more John Waters, Charm City Book Collector]
In one of his portraits of the convivial octogenarian turf journalist Colonel John R. Stingo, A. J. Liebling writes, Like most people of pronounced seniority he reads the obituary pages with attention, and had a morning of quiet triumph last winter when two insurance shamans, a past president of the Actuarial Society of America and the vice-president of a major company, died on the same day, aged sixty-two and fifty-four respectively. 'I bet they avoided excitement, late hours, high blood pressure, tasty food and intoxicating liquors and had themselves periodically examined with stethoscopes, fluoroscopes, spectroscopes and high-powered lenses,' the Colonel said. 'The result was inevitable and to be expected, the result of morbid preoccupation. The anxious fielder drops the ball.' Most antiquarian booksellers of my acquaintance shun morbid preoccupation. At book fairs and other venues where booksellers gather, one often finds colleagues gathered around the groaning board or even on occasion congregated in rooms where one may conveniently rest a foot upon a brass rail. Despite my own best efforts, a bit of the morbid preoccupation will on occasion creep in upon me; to combat the cumulative effects of the collegial life I will lace up my running shoes and set off at a lumbering trot of self-improvement through the streets of Ann Arbor. And when the cankering cares of business seem especially grim, I make certain my route takes me up through Ann Arbor's Forest Hill Cemetery. It ... [more The Perils of a Morbid Preoccupation.]
Where do you start with a place like Vegas? Bally's Hotel and Casino is hosting the 2014 Moose International convention and dealing with a chronic shortage of aquatic plant life, willow shoots, and other forage. Hairy guys with backwards baseball caps. Old men and their leisurewear. Fatties in mobile chairs work away, tethered to slot machines. A Bally's credit card at the other end of the line drips the money in and out. The tether prevents the card from being stolen, lost, or forgotten. Sorry, sir, no photographs. What is the plural of Moose ? Do the International Moose employ it? There is a convention in noir cinema – someone has slipped the detective a mickey, or the alcoholic is in the middle of a lost weekend, or an innocent party has received a life altering shock. “Sorry, honey. I'm leaving you for a Moose.” The movies represent this state of psychic distress by means of flashing lights, carnival midway noises, and squirming, spinning shapes. Everything is out of focus. Voices come in and out, layered with hallucinogenic visuals and shreds of pop songs. Places and times jam together like a freeway pileup. This is the lobby at Bally's Las Vegas Hotel and Casino. The mickey is optional, but the lights, noises, voices, and ghastly visuals surrounding me leave no doubt that I'm in someone's grade B detective flick, or lost weekend, or that the life altering shock is Las Vegas itself. A line in one of my aural hallucinations croons, “It's just too marvelous, too ma... [more Not This Time]
Member Chic Goldsmid reports having shipped (USPS, insured) a box of books to the District of Columbia. The box arrived today, having been opened and without the two books below: RICHARD WILBUR. Anterooms: New Poems and Translations. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2010 - Cloth. In jacket. Warm, personal Wilbur inscription to his friend and colleague, Robert Mezey. ALLEN GINSBERG. Fall of America: Poems of These States 1965-1971.SF: City Lights, (1972). In original printed paper wrapper. Customer uncertain that it is a first. Apparently also personally inscribed to Mezey and family. Please contact us or Chic if you know the whereabouts of these items. Charles Goldsmid: goldsmid@mindspring.com or (909) 625-2543. [more Missing: Poetry Inscribed Richard Wilbur & Allen Ginsberg]
Welcome to the new ABAA website. We hope you'll find it an exciting place to explore rare books, find items to purchase, and meet some of the best booksellers in the US. The site is packed with new features and possibilities. Many of these features are there to emphasize the individual booksellers, all of whom are members of the Antiquarian Booksellers' Association of America and are held to the strict standards of the ABAA Code of Ethics. Throughout the site, the booksellers are front and center, giving you more information about the seller on the item pages, more details on the bookseller pages, and a richer sense of what booksellers are up to on the blog and through various social media. The ABAA blog is brand new as well, now called The New Antiquarian, and featuring multiple contributors. Booksellers have richly different backgrounds and knowledge, so it only makes sense that we would want more than a single point of view on the new blog. We start with a number of booksellers who have proven themselves as interesting and engaging bloggers, but you can expect more voices in the future, and guest blogs from people outside of the ABAA, including Special Collections Librarians, book arts craftsmen, private collectors and more. While we've worked hard to create the best site we can, inevitably there will be a few bugs, so if you find one, please report it to the email address below. bugreport@abaa.org If you haven't already, we hope you will create a user account, so it will ... [more A Brand New ABAA Website!]
On June 17th, join ABAA members George Koppelman and Dan Wechsler for an evening at Swann Auction Galleries, where they will be speaking about their recently published book Shakespeare's Beehive and recounting "the story of how two antiquarian booksellers would acquire and conclude that it is William Shakespeare's own personal dictionary." Full details below. [more Lecture on Shakespeare’s Beehive at Swann Galleries]