Category Archives: Bookish History

Book Covers — a Web Miscellany

Suspiciously Similar Book Covers Guess the Classics Cover Design: US vs. UK The Battle Against ‘Sexist’ Sci-Fi and Fantasy Book Covers New Anniversary Cover for Harry Potter Cherish Your Favourite Book with a Bespoke Binding 10 Redesigned Covers Better Than … Continue reading

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Literary News and Bookish Potpourri — February 22, 2013

Awards and Honours Author and poet Joy Cowley and theatre director Duncan Whiting have been named Marlborough Living Treasures. Bill Nagelkerke has been awarded the 2013 Storylines Margaret Mahy Medal. The nominees for this year’s Nebula Awards have been announced … Continue reading

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Ernest Hemingway – Idol & Action Figure

The 2nd of July marks fifty years since Ernest Heminway, on a quiet Sunday morning, killed himself. It was shocking punctuation to a life lived like a challenge – full of wars, hunting, contentious marriages, travel, love, bravery, deception and … Continue reading

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Bloomsday – reprise

The physical and virtual world lit up for Bloomsday – tweets and Guinness and peripatetic homages flooded the day of those with a Joycean bent. The twitter feed @11lysses creatively recast the novel in a series of tweets from contributors … Continue reading

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Bloomsday 2011

Bloomsday, celebrated annually on June 16th, is a huge act of devotion to James Joyce’s novel, Ulysses, as well as the Dublin peregrinations of its main character, Leopold Bloom. The date corresponds with the events in that most classic of … Continue reading

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Judging a Book by its Cover

And why the hell not. Usually used as a cautionary moral, don’t judge a book by its cover, has always rankled a little. For many years I harboured a secret guilt that I did just that, judging by veneer, only … Continue reading

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Editing Enid

Hodder, the UK publisher of Enid Blyton’s work, has decided they are going to “sensitively and carefully” revise the text of her books. They’re starting with 10 of the Famous Five novels. Mercy me, or rather, as the new text … Continue reading

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Ulysses vs. Apple… well, almost.

Bloomsday is an annual day of celebration in Dublin that commemorates the life of James Joyce. Participants relive the events of Leopold Bloom’s odyssey around Dublin over the course of a day. Bloom is the protagonist in Joyce’s most famous … Continue reading

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Teen Sleuth Nancy Drew Turns 80

The teenage detective, who encouraged more than one generation of girls to look to themselves and their natural abilities to accomplish what they wanted, has turned 80. Girl power, indeed; I’d back Nancy over the Spice Girls any day of … Continue reading

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