[bksvol-discuss] rare out of print books, was, Re: Re: The Hold Issue & wish list books
- From: Julia <julia.kulak@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 25 Jul 2012 01:34:29 -0400
Hi everyone.
Speaking of hard to find books, Maureen Peters is another author
whose books are extremely rare. She's written several, mostly short
historical fiction under 200 pages. My Philippa, in particular, only
seems to be available on the net for a whopping $150, all the way from
New Zealand.
Julia
On 25/07/2012 1:02 AM, Ali Al-hajamy wrote:
That's a noble goal. I was thinking about this topic recently, books
that would, if not for the digitisation process, otherwise be lost.
Joseph McElroy, an author I have mentioned on here once before, is
practically unknown within the literary world. I don't think there has
ever been a single year where all of his books were in print at one
time (He's written eight or nine), and there are two in particular,
one called Hind's Kidnap, the other Actress in the House, which were
never reprinted after their firszt hardcover run. (D. Keith Mano had
the same thing happen to his novel Take Five [according to him, 1756
copies were sent out, and somehow, 1817 came back to the publisher].)
Because of this, Hind's Kidnap is, for now, incredibly rare and
expensive. There was a person at Constant Conversation who recalled
going to a bookstore, and seeing ten copies of it sitting on the
shelves, all available for the low low price of... $110. I was
thinking about what it would be like if, after a few decades, there
would simply be no more copies of Hind's Kidnap available for general
consumption by anyone who wasn't a rare book collector and who would
thus never read or sell them to anyone. I found the thought very
disturbing. Would we have to depend on the few people who have read it
to tell us what the book was about and what the experience of reading
it was like? Would the half remembered lines of prose from a person
here and there who had read it be the only indication of the quality
of its writing? Would Joseph McElroy die knowing that his novel, over
the years, had simply stopped existing, all copies available having
been destroyed or lost? Alexander Theroux was glad that his books were
not readily available or read to or by the public, viewing it as the
partial punishment of a society which rejected his texts due to their
unconventionality; I see it as a tragedy. I even expressed a wish, in
the Goodreads comment I wrote about this in, that someone scan the
book and put it on the ebook pirate networks that I'm sure exist
somewhere should anyone wish to find them. I wouldn't like that, I
said, but it was far preferable to that book just vanishing. Then I
was given a link to a publishing house which is going to digitize most
of McElroy's books, Hind's Kidnap included, and I wasn't disturbed
anymore. The fact remains, though, that if not for the process of
putting print books into digital formats, many, I might even take a
guess and say the majority of, paper only books can, and do,
disappear, so any attempts to save them is, I think, an incredibly
magnanimous effort.
On 25-Jul-12 00:32, Valerie Maples wrote:
Cindy;
We buy copies of the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew books as we can afford
and find them, so eventually, if we are allowed to continue our quest
on kids series, they will be done. Em Rose has access to many Nancy
Drew and I have proofed hers as well as Vivian Flores and Sister
Dolores Dean's as soon as they were up; usually within three days.
It is just getting them bought or located.
The bright side of this is my OCD need to preserve these historical
series will one day mean Bookshare will be the only library in the
country that has the only intact series of several out of print
series. We completed the Connie Blair Mysteries, Cherry Ames, Vicki
Barr, and Sue Barton, just to name a few. We are working on Kay
Tracey, Dana Girls, Kim Aldrich, Robin Kane, Ginny Gordon, Donna
Parker and I have nearly half the Judy Bolton books, just to name a
few. We own about forty Nancy Drew and possibly 25 Hardy Boys, among
others.
I want to continue to help Bookshare grow and preserve books that
will soon be lost if not digitized.
Valerie
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