Books are what I do : Write (very slowly), Read (rapidly or at leisure), Re-read (for pleasure or reference), Buy and Sell (my livelihood), Catalogue and Describe (ditto), Edit, Publish, Review (for The New York Review of Science Fiction and others), Recommend or Give away, Receive, and — unavoidably and repeatedly — Lift (whether singly or in boxes). I concede a fondness for private eye novels, equalled by my interest in the quirky, erudite, or obscure, and surpassed only by my love of the literature of the fantastic.
— Henry Wessells
marginal glosses
(via twitter)
5 July 2016
links
current reading
— Mathias Enard. Zone. Roman. [2008]. Babel, [2015].
— Pierre Assouline. Golem. Roman. NRF Gallimard, 2016.
commonplace book
mural of the reader, by Ferdinand Humbert, in the Petit Palais
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a clearing in the forêt de St. Cloud : the approach to the memorial of the Escadrille Lafayette
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Horace Walpole owned one of John Dee’’s scrying stones, an Aztec obsidian mirror : seen at RCP Dee show https://www.rcplondon.ac.uk/johndee/
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“ where love may now be sheer energy of attention ”
William S. Wilson : collected writings : https://williamswilsonwritings.wordpress.com
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Bookshops : recently visited
Les Cahiers de Colette, rue Rambuteau, Paris
Tender Books, Cecil Court, London
Rizzoli, New York
Unnameable Books, Brooklyn
Marfa Book Co., Marfa, Texas
Fifth Dimension Books book-bus, Austin, Texas
Malvern Books, Austin, Texas
Mysterious Bookshop, New York
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Readercon Schedule
Friday 8 July
4:00 p.m. End of the World and After : from Mary Shelley to J.G. Ballard, Russell Hoban, and Beyond. Chris Brown (leader), Jack Haringa, Faye Ringel, Henry Wessells, Gary K. Wolfe.
7:00 p.m. A Conversation Larger than the Universe. Another instalment of Recent Reading in the Literature of the Fantastic : a history of science fiction, from 1762 to the present, and a highly personal tour through the collection of Henry Wessells.
Readercon 27, 7-10 July 2016, in Quincy, Mass.
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recent reading
— C.R.Maturin. Melmoth the Wanderer (1820). [Penguin paperback, re-reading : into the labyrinth of narrative].
— David Foenkinos. Le mystère Henri Pick. Roman. NRF Gallimard, [2016].
— Wormwood 26. Edited by Mark Valentine. Tartarus Press, Spring 2016.
— Apollinaire. Le regard du poète. Musées de l’Orsay et de l’Orangerie. Gallimard, [2016]. Catalogue of the exhibition at the Orangerie, 6 April - 18 July 2016.
the bay leaf : à mon ami Guillaume Apollinaire Pompei 1917 Picasso [detail from catalogue].
— Laffcon 1. The World’s First and Only R.A. Lafferty Conference. June 4, 2016. Guests of Honor Michael Swanwick Lissanne Lake. [Lawrenceville, N.J. : Ktistec Press, 2016] at the Mercer Co. Library in Lawrenceville, N.J.
— Bookspace. Collected Essays on Libraries. Edited by Maria Inês Cruz and Lozana Rosenova. [London : Inland editions, 2015].
— [Sara Coleridge]. Phantasmion. London : William Pickering, 1837. The first fantasy novel in English, a tale of Fairyland, set entirely in the secondary world. By the daughter of poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
— Bob Rosenthal. Cleaning Up New York. The Little Book Room, [2016]. New edition, forty years after the original.
— Michel Faber. Under the Skin. A Harvest Book. Harcourt, [2000 ; paperback, 9th ptg, n.d.].
— Dorothy L. Sayers. Gaudy Night. Victor Gollancz Ltd, 1935.
— Eric Stotik. Fugue. Hoffman Gallery of Contemporary Art, Lewis & Clark College, 2015. Exhibition catalogue, https://www.lclark.edu/live/news/30666-eric-stotik-fugue.
— Dark Mountain 9. Eds. Paul Kingsnorth & Dougald Hine. Dark Mountain Project, Spring 2016. Includes the first print publication of ‘ a Stone and a Cloud ’ by Brendan C. Byrne.
— Tom La Farge. Maznoona. [Book two of The Enchantments]. Spuyten Duyvil, [2016].
— Quack This Way. David Foster Wallace & Bryan A. Garner Talk Language and Writing. February 3, 2006. [Penrose, 2013].
— Neal Stephenson. The Diamond Age. Bantam Spectra pbk. (Bought in Austin, from the Fifth Dimension Books book-bus).
— Youme Landowne & Anthony Horton. Pitch Black. Don’t Be Skerd. Cinco Puntos Press, [2006].
— Joshua Edwards. Photographs Taken at One-Hour Intervals during a Walk from Galveston Island to the West Texas Town of Marfa. [Stuttgart :] Edition Solitude. Reihe Projektiv, [printed by McNaughton & Gunn, 2014].
— Darcie Dennigan. Palace of Subatomic Bliss. Canarium Books, [2016].
— A Little Ramble: In the Spirit of Robert Walser. Christine Burgin. Donald Young Gallery, New Directions, [2012].
— Jacques Réda. Europes. Translated and with an introduction by Aaron Prevots. Austin, TX : Host, [2009].
— Elizabeth Hand. Hard Light. A Cass Neary Crime Novel. Minotaur Books, 2016.
— [Ben Kinmont]. Open by Chance & Appointment. Sebastopol : [Antinomian Press], 2015.
— Anthony Powell. The Military Philosophers (1968). “ Powell is the best critical study of Proust ” — Guy Davenport. (Now I see).
— Guillermo Martínez. The Oxford Murders. Translated by Sonia Soto (2005). Penguin, [2006].
— Richard Jefferies. After London ; Or, Wild England : In Two Parts : Part 1 — The Relapse into Barbarism; Part II — Wild England. London : Cassell and Company, 1885.
— Brendan C. Byrne. ‘ a Stone and a Cloud ’ http://flapperhouse.com/2016/03/10/a-stone-and-a-cloud-fiction-by-brendan-byrne/.
— The New York Review of Science Fiction. David G, Hartwell memorial issue, no. 330. Burrowing Wombat Press, February 2016.
— The Green Book 7. Easter Rising centennial issue. Swan River Press, Bealtaine, 2016. Memoirs of 1916 by Irish writers of the fantastic.
— Michael Swanwick & Marianne Porter. Fallen Leaves. With 15 plates from photographs. Edition of 20, signed. Dragonstairs, 2016. Out of print upon publication.
— H.G. Wells. The Island of Doctor Moreau. 1896.
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e-booke re-issue of Hope-in-the Mist
A new edition of Michael Swanwick’s Hope-in-the Mist. The Extraordinary Career & Mysterious Life of Hope Mirrlees (2009) is in preparation, for release in all the usual e-booke formats through Weightless Books in early August, in time for MidAmericon II (Worldcon), where Mr. Swanwick will be guest of honor. Further details will be made available as soon as your correspondent can update the information page, here.
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Wander in the Archives
The Archives of the Endless Bookshelf have been swept and tidied and a guide has been prepared to assist wanderers. Index would be too strong a term : the headwords tend to be suggestive rather than directive. Start here. Have fun.
This creaking and constantly evolving website of the endless bookshelf : some entries are brief mentions, others take the form of more elaborate essays and reviews. Someday, not soon, comments or interactivity. Right now you’ll have to send links to me, dear readers. [HWW]
electronym : wessells
at aol dot com
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Henry
Wessells and individual contributors.
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