Rare Books in the News: August 3, 2009

Reprint agreement will make U-M rare books widely available
The University of Michigan will make thousands of books that are no longer in copyright -- including rare and one-of-a-kind titles -- available as reprints on demand under a new agreement with BookSurge, part of the Amazon.com group of companies. The agreement gives the public a unique opportunity to buy reprints of a wide range of titles in the U-M Library for as little as a few dollars. As individual copies are sold on Amazon.com, BookSurge will print and bind the books in soft-cover form. "This agreement means that titles that have been generally unavailable for a century or more will be able to go back into print, one copy at a time," said Paul N. Courant, U-M librarian and dean of libraries.

Brand New, Again
Rare books dating back to the 17th century will take on a familiar yet somewhat refreshed form when Cambridge University Press officially begins scanning and reprinting original copies from the university library. To celebrate the 475th anniversary of the founding of the press (and 425 years printing books) Cambridge will scan 475 volumes from the library's collection of rare materials, including works by Darwin, Shakespeare, and Charles Babbage. The university hopes to scan an additional 1,000 books by the end of the year, all of which will be available on a print-on-demand basis for $15 to $25.

OSU's main library reopens today after three-year, $109 million renovation
The atria also have two major exhibit spaces. The first showcases a sampling of the library's 250,000-volume special collections of books, posters, wardrobes and historic manuscripts called "Journeys." Three of Ohio State's 10 special collections of rare books and other items, now in several campus locations, will be brought together in Thompson and made available for exhibition and research. "What good is it to have these collections if they are locked up away where no one can see them?" said Raimund Goerler, interim director of libraries.

Hindu students celebrate the `Goddess of Knowledge'
Hindu students and teachers arrived at their schools dressed in traditional Balinese attire Saturday, to pay homage to Saraswati, the goddess of knowledge. Across the island, special offerings were placed on books and lontar manuscripts believed to be the earthly throne of the goddess. No classes were held in the majority of schools in Denpasar as most students and teachers gathered at the schools' respective temples. Female students brought beautiful offerings made of colorful flowers and fruits to the school's library and placed them on stacked books draped with yellow and white cloths. Similar offerings were also placed on computers. After completing the offering rituals, the students and teachers prayed together to the goddess. In several schools, religion teachers gave sermons about the meaning of the celebration and the importance of knowledge.

Historic Torah scrolls buried in Ukraine
The Jewish community in a western Ukrainian city buried the fragments of 221 damaged Torah scrolls recently returned by the state. The fragments and damaged Torah scrolls were buried Tuesday in accordance with Jewish law in the Zhytomir Jewish cemetery. The items were returned in late March from the local state archive to the Jewish community two years after they were confiscated by Ukrainian authorities. Activists in the Jewish community, representatives of local authorities and journalists took part in the ceremony on the eve of 9th of Av near the local synagogue building, after which all the Torah fragments were buried at the Jewish cemetery.

Dead Sea Scrolls almost identical to Pentateuch, Haftorahs
For the most part, the Torah and Jewish prophetic portions of the Dead Sea Scrolls, which can be seen at the Royal Ontario Museum, are identical to the traditional Pentateuch and Haftorahs. But their authorship remains a topic of scholarly debate. So said Dr. Martin Abegg, Ben Zion Wacholder Professor of Dead Sea Scrolls Studies at the religious studies department at Trinity Western University in Langley, BC, and co-director of the Dead Sea Scrolls Institute. Professor Abegg delivered an enthusiastic speech at the Royal Ontario Museum Signy and Cleophee Eaton theatre last Thursday as part of the Anne Tannenbaum Dead Sea Scrolls lecture series, which coincides with the ROM Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit.

Stripping Away the Darkness as Murals Are Reborn
The murals “were supposed to be in harmony with the warm, stone color of the marble,” he explained. With the cleaning, he added, “it was as though we’d switched on the lights.” The ravages of age became apparent in other ways, too. For example, over the years the baby in “Abolition of War” had been obscured and looked like a blemish. Two years ago, when Tishman Speyer, co-owner and manager of Rockefeller Center, hired EverGreene, Mr. Greene spent six months doing nothing but research. “I read the Rockefeller family archives,” he said. (Robert J. Speyer, senior managing director of Tishman Speyer, would not specify the project’s cost, although it is believed to exceed seven figures.)

Austrian has Indiana Jones moment in Mongolia
Digging for buried treasure in the Gobi Desert sounds like the opening scene of an Indiana Jones film. For Austrian-born Michael Eisenriegler, it was a real-life adventure. The 40-year-old amateur archaeologist was in the Gobi over the weekend, helping to unearth Buddhist relics that had been buried for more than seven decades in a remote part of Mongolia. Less than an hour of digging revealed two crates filled with priceless treasure, including rare manuscripts, Buddhist statues and clothing.

Three are 'curators of a colossal collection'
What do George S. Champlin, Robert T. Galkin and Col. Webster Knight have in common? All were stamp collectors. Being men of means, they assembled huge and valuable collections. All three collections are now part of the Brown University Special Collections, housed in the John Hay Library. Now, three other men who are also stamp collectors are the caretakers of the assembled collection, worth an estimated $20 million: Louis McGowan, Thomas Greene and Chester Browning. McGowan is also the president of the Johnston Historical Society, Greene is a noted historian from North Providence and Browning is the retired state photographer and is also archivist for T.F. Green Airport. All are members of the Rhode Island Philatelic Society, the oldest continuously run stamp-collecting club in the United States. Browning is currently president of the society.

UA Acquires Up with People Archives
The University of Arizona Libraries have acquired the organizational papers of the global youth performance and cultural exchange group Up with People. The UA Libraries also acquired are the organizational papers of the Up with People International Alumni Association and the personal papers of its founder and Chairman Emeritus, J. Blanton Belk, and his wife Elizabeth "Betty" Belk. The archives consist of correspondence, news clippings, photographs, videos and other publications. The Belk's personal archive consists also of correspondence, photographs and personal memoirs.

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