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Showing posts with label Books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Books. Show all posts

Sunday, 22 January 2017

Books and Authors - Sunday Stamps II

Young Folks, a magazine for children, serialised a story between 1881 and 1882. The story was credited to 'Captain George North.'

On 14 November 1883 Cassell & Co published it as a book in the author's name.

Another Young Folks' story appeared in May/July 1886, followed by a second book.

Ill health in his later years caused the author to travel in the South Pacific and spend time in the Gilbert Islands, Tahiti and New Zealand. He eventually settled in the Samoan Islands where he built a family property which became his home for the remainder of his life.

On 29 April 1969 Samoa commemorated the author and his book on the 75th anniversary of his death.


I remember reading both of those books when I was boy.

I know the story of Stevenson's third book published in 1886. You all must know it as well.

Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
It has also appeared as 'The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde' and as just 'Jekyll and Hyde.'

The fourth book of Stevenson on the Samoan stamps was an unfinished novel, set in the Napoleonic Wars, cut short by his sudden death in 1894 from a cerebral haemorrhage.

Weir of Hermiston - (1896 Chatto & Windus)
Robert Louis Stevenson's tombstone rests atop Mount Vaea in Samoa.

Weir of Hermiston can be read as a virtual book here. Hermiston is a suburb of Edinburgh. In 1907 the city of Hermiston, Oregon was named after the book.

For other authors and their works check out Sunday-Stamps-II-110. where there is another Scottish connection.


Thursday, 9 January 2014

Photo Archives - Sepia Saturday.

The prompt this week is just the thing to lead me astray; do I concentrate on books or photos or both?


I have found several books which you might classify as old in one way or another, but they did not contain any loose photos - sepia or otherwise. However I do have a box file (not a cardboard box like Alan's) in which are stored sepia photos, postcards and my newest book.

'Sepia Saturday' Box File
The photo on the left has been annotated on the back, "Is it you, or is it me? Mick" My wife is convinced that this is her elder sister Mick when she was young.

The one on the right is the old ferry at Hartlepool.

I left with a bit of a quandary. How do you judge the age of a book - by when it was written or when it was printed? Here's four to illustrate the point.

Chaucer - The Canterbury Tales &
John Bunyan -The Pilgrim's Progress
Chaucer was born about 1340 and died in 1400. He is buried in Westminster Abbey.
Bunyan, born in 1628, died 1688 lies in the Bunhill Fields Cemetery, London along with Daniel Defoe and William Blake.
The Penguin Classic, The Canterbury Tales was first published in 1951 - note the price of 5/-
The New American Library's edition of The Pilgrim's Progress appeared in 1964 at $1.75.

I noticed that the book in our prompt had the text in two columns. I can match that with our copy, a wedding present from 1958, of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare ( baptised in April 1564, died 23 April 1616).

Shakespeare' s The Winter's Tale
The last of my books is The Pickwick Papers, the first novel of Charles Dickens published in 1836.

The Fat Boy Awakes - The Pickwick Papers
What's special about this book for me? Just look at the inscription.

Form Prize at Stamford School 1949
Having been carried away by books I turned back to archives and this file of:

Prospekt Kort (Postcards)
This is the file put together by my daughter while I was working in Norway between 1979 and 1988. The cards are those I sent to her during that time - some have appeared on Sepia Saturday before.

In my archive search I came across some 'old' albums.

I wonder what happened to them
But when I turned the page, this is what I found.

Honeymoon(?) on the left in 1958; our two sons in 1960s
The second album contained more photo's, all in colour.

Cutting Our Wedding Cake
Finally I opened the top drawer of the desk in our lounge and found the largest collection of all.

Photos, photos, photos!
Now I need advice. Do I throw them all away when they are all stored here,


and on the Internet?

For other Sepians' views check out the links on Sepia-Saturday-210.

Tuesday, 12 February 2013

Teaser Tuesday - Prophecy by Peter James

Teaser Tuesday is a meme hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading.

Rules for participating:


  • Grab your current read
  • Open to a random page
  • Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
  • BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
  • Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!
Peter James is one of my favourite authors; I started by reading his DS Grace detective books but my teaser this week is not from this series but a stand-alone thriller.



Cold musty air that smelled of damp stone and rotting wood poured out, enveloping her, seeped through her clothes into her skin, and she stared at the wooden steps that descended almost vertically, their bottom rungs swallowed by blackness, with a sudden sickening feeling of dread.


 This part of London was riddled with secret passages dating back to the  Middle Ages and were used by prisoners escaping from the Tower, by Royalists during the Civil War, by smugglers.

p217 

Thursday, 5 April 2012

Sepia Saturday's Library

Despite the amount of time I spend in the local libraries and my love of books this is what I found.

Unknown Library (?) Art
However at the British Library some works need translation.

Miniature of the martyrdom of Thomas Becket, and the beginning of his suffrage, Book of Hours
(18 January 2012 Source British Library manuscripts blog)

For the interior of a library the years have moved on.

Library - 1842
Perhaps the linguists among my readers can translate the description: Source - Eberhard Gailer: Neuer orbis pictus für die Jugend oder Schauplatz der Natur, der Kunst und des Menschenlebens. 5. Auflage, Reutlingen, Joh. Conr. Mäcken jun., 1842.

The source for may photos shown on Sepia Saturday is often the Library of Congress so here's another from there.

Low Library Rotunda - Columbia University, New York City - 1900-1910
 Then there is this shot where a Pets for Therapy dog was the star. The venue's a library.

Luka, a Bernese Mountain Dog in Yarm Library
 For more bookish library posts pay a visit to Sepia Saturday 120


Tuesday, 7 February 2012

Dickens for Sepia Saturday


For me there could only be one interpretation of the Books theme this week. Today, 7 February is the 200th anniversary of this man's birthday.:

Charles Dickens 1868

Source: Project Gutenberg ebook of Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens, 1911.  From a photograph by Gurney
In pride of  place on my bookshelf is a book I won as a form prize way back in 1949.

The Pickwick Papers
It so happens that I discovered Mr Pickwick and Sam Weller in an illustration which I though you might enjoy.

Wood engraving: 19th century. 
Characters from the books of Charles Dickens
(Photograph 1950 -1970 - unknown author)

The description with the photograph says, "The man seated in the chair is  Mr. Pickwick, a character from Charles Dickens’ first novel The Pickwick Papers, listening to his astute and humorous valet, Sam Weller, as he points out other characters from Dickens’ books. For example, midway up the left edge, from A Christmas Carol, are Ebenezer Scrooge in a night cap, and Bob Cratchit carrying his crippled son, Tiny Tim. In the bottom left corner, from The Old Curiosity Shop, are Little Nell and her grandfather. Fagin, from Oliver Twist, is third from the left in the front row with Mr. Bumble (in the bicorn or cocked hat), his wife Widow Corney, Oliver Twist, the Artful Dodger, and Charley Bates nearby."

I must say you need very good eyesight to make them out. There is no doubt however about who is in the next photo.

Artist Fred Barnard (1846-1896)
Title "Mr. Pickwick Picnics"
Date 1870s
  • Source: "The Anniversary Edition of the Works of Charles Dickens, February 7, 1812". The books were published in 1911 by P.F. Collier & Son of New York. This illustration is from the book, "Pickwick Papers Part I"
  • Flickr: Mr Pickwick uploaded by Sue Clark
  • License: CC BY 2.0
Today, thanks to Stockton Central Library's Facebook post I learned something new about Dickens. Apparently Dickens' study had a secret door designed to look like a bookcase which was full of fake books with titles such as Noah's Arkitecture, a nine-volume set titled Cat's Lives and The Virtues of Our Ancestors, which was so narrow that the title had to be printed vertically. Are there fake books on your shelves?
 And a final picture of the great man who ranks close behind Shakespeare in literary merit.

Charles Dickens, circa 1860

Project Gutenberg ebook of Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens
Photo by  J. & C. Watkins
As some of you may know I have been a volunteer text corrector for the Dickens Journals Online Project. They are celebrating his birthday by announcing the completion of all the correction process. You may find out about the project at http://www.djo.org.uk/

To immerse yourself in more books just click here