On the Shelf

The Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Grahame (Hardback); The Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum (Hardback); The Book of Dragons, selected by Michael Hague (Hardback); The Reluctant Dragon, by Kenneth Grahame (Softcover); all Illustrated by Michael Hague.

I first started getting Hague editions in the early 80’s, with ‘Willows’; I remember at the toy store ‘Yellow Brick Road’ they had little stuffed toys of Toad and the others with Hague’s art printed on cloth as a tie-in. I like his work; it is reminiscent of a classical style, like Rackham’s. And dragons and Oz? Of course I must have them. He did an edition of “The Hobbit” too, which I’ll get to in time.

Ranking: Keepers.

File Code: Illustrated Editions. Classics.

The Adventure Time Encyclopaedia: Inhabitants, Lore, Spells, and Ancient Cryptic Warnings of the Land of Ooo circa 19.56 B. G. E. – 501 A. G. E., Compiled by His Lowness Hunson Abadeer, Lord of Evil. Translated from the Scrolls of Ooo by Martin Olson.

Another ‘fake book’, covering the period when Adventure Time was a great series, before it became too preachy and stumbled down into darkness. Man, what a ride. A guide to characters, events, and lore, with copious illustration on every page. Even its calligraphy is ever-changingly amusing.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Guidebook. Cartoon. Hardback.

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, and The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul, by Douglas Adams.

“Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency is a humorous detective novel by English writer Douglas Adams, first published in 1987. It is described by the author on its cover as a "thumping good detective-ghost-horror-who dunnit-time travel-romantic-musical-comedy-epic". The book was followed by a sequel, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul. The only recurring major characters are the eponymous Dirk Gently, his secretary Janice Pearce and Sergeant Gilks. Adams also began work on another novel, The Salmon of Doubt, with the intention of publishing it as the third book in the series, but died before completing it.” – Wikipedia. I kept these novels after abandoning the Hitchhiker’s series; they are an ace better, or at least less annoying. Has been made into a questionable BBC television show.

Ranking: Keepers.

File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Hardbacks.

The Deeper Meaning of Liff, by Douglas Adams and John Lloyd.

Perhaps the best and funniest of all Adams’ books, it is “a dictionary of things that there aren't any words for yet". Rather than inventing new words, Adams and Lloyd picked a number of existing place-names and assigned interesting meanings to them, meanings that can be regarded as on the verge of social existence and ready to become recognisable entities. All the words listed are toponyms and describe common feelings and objects for which there is no current English word. Examples are Shoeburyness ("The vague uncomfortable feeling you get when sitting on a seat that is still warm from somebody else's bottom") and Plymouth ("To relate an amusing story to someone without remembering that it was they who told it to you in the first place"). The book cover usually bears the tagline "This book will change your life", either as part of its cover or as an adhesive label. Liff (a village near Dundee in Scotland) is then defined in the book as "A book, the contents of which are totally belied by its cover. For instance, any book the dust jacket of which bears the words, 'This book will change your life'." – Wikipedia. An expanded edition of “The Meaning of Liff.”

Ranking: Keeper.

File Code: Humor. Parodic Dictionary. Hardback.

Letters, by Sylvia Townsend Warner. Edited by William Maxwell.

The two works of Warner that I have (Kingdoms of Elfin and a biography of T. H. White) are so good that when I saw this at a San Marcos Library sale, I had to have it. There is something very personal about reading an author’s letters, especially from such as a good writer as Warner, as she writes about her life as it was lived. Of special intensity for me was her letter on page 226, when she talks about visiting White’s house on Aldernay, just four months after his death, and seeing all his personal items still sitting around, ‘defenceless as a corpse’. She said she could feel his presence ‘morose, suspicious, intensely watchful, and determined to despair,’ as imminent a haunt as she had ever experienced in her life. Most of the letters of course, are about her life, her writing, and her love Valentine, all told in the most perceptive and lucid prose that is almost poetry, supple without being high-flown.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Letters. Biography. Hardback.

A Treasury of the Familiar Volume I, Edited by Ralph L. Woods.

I found this book at a local library sale, and was surprised to find it had belonged to Malcolm Bonorden, the rather scary 6^th grade teacher at McQueeney, the only male teacher at school. I was looking through this copy (once Malcolm Bonorden's, bought at a library sale). The man was 57, dude; in a month I'll be as old as Malcolm Bonorden ever was. The man always seemed writhen to me, but then I was only 8 or 9. I kind of foolishly dreaded being in his class, not being a manly little boy, then Briesemeister opened up and saved me from ever having to face that. Looking at his book (with pages turned down at "The Shooting of Dan McGrew" and "Little Orphant Annie" and especially "The Fool's Prayer" - which I always liked since I was a freshman in high school - gave me a strange new insight into his character. The book itself is an amazing treasury of what was popular in 1942, recitation pieces and famous addresses and poetry and documents like the Declaration of Independence … if you want to put your head into a certain historical American state of mind, browse this book.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Treasury. Hardback.