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thebookmonger
auctioneer extraordinaire!
Just another hard working guy trying to make a living...
Welcome to my personal cyberspace storefront! Over the last
half dozen years or more, have been running eBay auctions from
home, thus I'm constantly searching for that next little printed
something or other which will place a smile on my face, and with a bit of
luck, some added coin in my pockets. Yet I must say, even after nearly 30 years working
with used books, paper collectables and miscellaneous ephemera, seldom does a day pass without discovering some new and fascinating
item I never knew existed. Now I ask, do I have a great job or what?! Normally
I will post a fresh batch of fairly diverse eBay auctions each and every week,
endeavoring my level best to present
each item clearly, accurately and thoughtfully. All too often, I spend extra time on descriptions when encountering some interesting
historical tidbit or other that I want to share with my customers. (or more
likely, simply to amuse myself!)
Thus, I would certainly encourage you to browse through my auctions from week to week, and if you perhaps don’t find
something to bid upon this
time around, I hope to have at least put a smile on your face, while
enticing you to check back regularly for future auctions offered by thebookmonger
Please
Visit My Virtual Bookstore
For More Great Deals
provided by MarketWorks
Thank you for your patronage!
|
hard at work at thebookmonger headquarters |
thebookmonger jr |
"Le buste survit a la cite"
THUS WROTE the poet Theophile Gautier, or, in George Santayana's unforgettable translation, "The bust outlasts the citadel."
A book is so fragile in appearance that a child can tear it up and destroy it; it can be tossed into the fire (not to mention its author, sometimes, for greater surety). It is so naked, under its ludicrous leather covering; it is a diminutive heap of paper, and much like insects we cannot crush because they are too small. By what mystery, then, can this miniature thing resist the powers of destruction? Like insects, you reply, by power of multiplication. Print one thousand copies of a book and it can laugh at danger. Like an army of fresh rested troops it moves forward over the battlefield of time; it may be instantly decimated by constant enemy fire, but it knows its objective and is certain of attaining it, if with only a handful of survivors. The printed book possesses power above all other powers, a force practically invincible, nay, invincible!
No power of persuasion is comparable to that of the book. The most gifted orator dominates and carries a crowd away for a moment, thanks to his unaccountable prestige of voice or glance. Later, its admiring tribute paid, the crowd does as it wills.
The book, on the other hand, is modest and mute. It makes no demands. It bears abandonment, mutilation and oblivion. It always has the last word! It deposits in the human mind germs over which nothing can prevail. One day, despite the will and prejudice of their host, these germs develop and live, and finally modify the very spirit they inhabit. Born of thought and feeling, books in their turn create other thoughts and other feelings that end logically in other books, and so ad infinitum. Civilization, ceaselessly modified by books, proves to be the reflection of books in the works of men. Books are the fathers and masters of civilization; their control is essentially magical.
That is why books have always inspired tyrants with horror and they strive their utmost to destroy them. Omar burned the library at Alexandria; the Inquisition burned the writings of heretics; Hitler burned the books of men who did not believe in Nazism. But the book defiantly laughs at assault and wrath. The book lives when its enemies long since are dead; it is ever prepared to recreate a new world of free, intelligent, and happy men.
From the Preface by Francis de Miomandre in A Code for the Collector of Beautiful Books, New York, The Limited Editions Club, 1936
"All eyes are opened, or opening, to the rights of man. The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God. These are grounds of hope for others..."
~ Thomas Jefferson ~
The Bibliomaniac's Prayer"But if, O Lord, it pleaseth Thee
To keep me in temptation's way,
I humbly ask that I may be
Most notably beset to-day;
Let my temptation be a book,
Which I shall purchase, hold and keep,
Whereon, when other men shall look,
They'll wail to know I got it cheap."
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