In the second episode in our series on how the shop works, we’re talking about specificity. Before the Brattle can buy a group of books, we have to figure out what they are. Sounds simple, right? But often, the person calling us is not the person who collected the books, and they’re not sure what they have. We’ll ask, ‘What kind of books are they?’ and they’ll reply, ‘Fiction and non-fiction’ or ‘Hardcovers and paperbacks.’ Even if we can narrow it down to, say, books on food, that could mean thousands of different things, from fast food pamphlets to the first cookbook published in America (American Cookery). Learn how we narrow it down, and what makes a library desirable in general, on this laser-focused #brattlecast.
Brattlecast #107 - Favorite Books
In this episode, Ken talks about some of his favorite book encounters, from a long career filled with them. There’s Isaac Newton’s own copy of Principia Mathematica, an unsuccessful prospector’s gold rush diary, and a book woven entirely out of silk. It’s nearly impossible to pick a single favorite, but overall, the books that came with a great story have made more of an impression on him than the ones that were simply monetarily valuable.
As things open up again, we’d like to encourage our listeners to visit our shop at 9 West Street in Downtown Boston to see this and thousands of other fascinating items!
Bonus Brattlecast - Covid Collectables
Like it or not, we’re living through a fairly dramatic historic event. What kinds of documents and ephemera being generated today will be of interest to future collectors and historians as they try to parse the impact of the Covid-19 crisis on the lives of everyday people? In a time when so many of us get our news from twitter, what physical artifacts might remain to remind us of these troubling and unprecedented weeks? Also, we remind you to please feel free to email or call the shop—Ken is there looking after things, and staying connected is important to us while the shop is closed to the public.
