British Map Engravers
Not strictly speaking part of the narrative, more a matter of unashamed self-advertisement. The long-awaited (and fearfully heavy – over two kilos) “British Map Engravers” was published today. And as I shall be visiting and talking to a number of ABA members in the course of hand-delivering their copies, I shall treat it as part of the journey and certainly blogworthy.
Some 1,600 entries, nearly 800 pages, around 600 illustrations – a long, costly and arduous business to get it into print. But all starting to seem worthwhile now the e-mails are beginning to come in from happy subscribers.
Other than that, a busy week on ABA matters. Plans being drawn up for the big book fair next summer, correspondence with the British Library over their moratorium on book-buying (they have now agreed to a meeting), thoughts on the extraordinary US legal ruling on the resale of books printed overseas, concern over auctioneers – and investigating the possibility of an ILAB app to lead the smartphone world to the world’s best booksellers.
The Bookhunter on Safari 