Now desecrating the book is de rigueur. I can't wrap my mind around it. I have tried it -- I tore a page from an out-of-date atlas and did some cut stencils, like so:
but I'm having a really hard time wrapping my mind around this particular kind of repurposing. Every time I see it in a magazine or suchlike, I recoil in distaste and a kind of horror. And having tried it hasn't ameliorated the feeling. (I won't be doing it again.) It feels a little too Fahrenheit 451 -- the willful destruction of the work and thoughts of others, the eradication of history, the painting over and massive whiting-out of ideas. It feels too arrogant -- your work is as nothing except a spur to my work. Bratty kids trampling the garden for the joy of destruction, with no thought to the loss of the necessary harvest. It just feels wrong.
Maybe I protest too much. I am all in favor of reusing and repurposing trash into treasure . . . but-but-but . . . 'Green' be damned. In this time when the book is an empire in decline, it troubles me that its glories are so far denigrated that the book is truly becoming only worth the paper it's printed on.
Posts
8 comments:
Oh-My-God....you have put my hidden thoughts about altered books into words. Words that I was too cowardly to express. Books have been my best friend through many periods in my life and to mark them up just doesn't trip my trigger. Although I have seen some tres cool altered books I leave the exploration of this medium to others.
You've found the words about altered books that resonate with me. I had not been able to come up with a reason/words as to why doing one did not appeal to me. I've been driven to tears when forced to give up any old and worn books to make room for new ones ... and I wasn't throwing them away, but giving them to Good Will and shelters.
I am with you on the altered books... I was brought up to respect books and now am unable to alter myself. why don't you make a book?
Thanks, everyone. I don't know why this was the first thing in my mind this morning, but anxiety about having posted it flitted in and out and around during the rest of the day.
I'm glad I'm not the only one etc.
Thank you so much for your thoughts on this! It resonates exactly with my feelings. I do love art quilts and collages and new techniques...but altered books make me very sad. I think some of it comes from the fact that i'm Jewish, and was always taught to revere books...not just The Book, but all books. If you accidentally drop a book that contains the name of G*d in it, you are supposed to pick up the book and kiss it. Books have been my friends; books transmit wisdom from other cultures and other times. How could i desecrate them by "altering" them? There's a wonderful book for young people called The Book Thief that has a lot to do with the power of words and the power of books...and one of the main characters white washes the pages of the only book at hand (Das Kapital) and hand writes an exceptionally meaningful story for the heroine on it...now that sort of repurposing i'm o.k. with.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. I am with you 100%. I, too, cannot bring myself to do this. I see lovely works that others have done and I long to do the same, and I will. Just only with a blank book. I just can't "desecrate", as you said, someone else's hard work. Would I want that done to my work? NO! (I'm so bad that I make copies of text to tear into scraps!)
Me too! I have even bought trashy-looking op shop books for the very purpose...then re-donated them because I just can't seem to gut them.
But for M's ATC I did cut one of my poems from a book!It's one of the extras from the printers and as it's mine it didn't feel quite so wrong. But it still didn't feel "right" either!
I wasn't able to comment on this earlier but when I came across this poem in our local broadsheet recently I thought I would share it with you. It's called 'There is no Frigate like a Book', by Emily Dickenson:
There is no Frigate like a Book
To take us Lands away
Nor any Coursers like a Page
Of prancing Poetry -
This Traverse may the poorest take
Without oppress of Toll -
How frugal is the Chariot
That bears the Human soul.
This is how I feel about books having been brought up to respect them.
Once I fell into that heinous trap of defacement having seen someone else's clever use of an old book, but Barnaby Rudge will never be the same again for my desecrations. It should not be allowed on pain of twenty minutes on the rack and a good flogging!
Post a Comment