French writer Roger Caillois spent more than twenty-five years collecting stones whose natural markings resembled landscapes, forests, storms, ruins and figures. None were carved or painted; their images were produced by mineral pressure, fractures and time. His collection eventually grew to more than a thousand specimens and inspired The Writing of Stones, in which geology becomes a form of art created before human beings arrived to look at it.
The Urantia Book is a 2,097-page religious text published anonymously in Chicago in 1955. It calls Earth “Urantia” and explains God, human history and the life of Jesus through 196 papers attributed to an extensive hierarchy of celestial beings. Its origins centre on psychiatrist William Sadler and an unidentified man who reportedly delivered communications while asleep; no human author was ever named. The book combines Christian theology with cosmology, philosophy and elaborate descriptions of inhabited worlds, superuniverses and their management. It is less a scripture than an administrative manual for infinity.
The Codex Rotundus is a late-15th-century Book of Hours whose parchment pages and cover were cut into circles just 9.3 centimetres across. Its 266 pages contain prayers in Latin and French, three full-page miniatures and thirty illustrated initials.
The Cheese and the Worms is a 1976 book by Carlo Ginzburg about a sixteenth-century Italian miller who believed the universe began as cheese and angels emerged from it like worms. His ideas survive because the Inquisition wrote them down.
Thomas Phillipps was an English antiquary and book collector who amassed the largest collection of manuscript material in the 19th century. He was an illegitimate son of a textile manufacturer and inherited a substantial estate, which he spent almost entirely on vellum manuscripts and, when out of funds, borrowed heavily to buy manuscripts, thereby putting his family deep into debt. Phillipps recorded in an early catalogue that his collection was instigated by reading various accounts of the destruction of valuable manuscripts. Such was his devotion that he acquired some 40,000 printed books and 60,000 manuscripts, arguably the largest collection a single individual has created, and coined the term "vello-maniac" to describe his obsession, which is more commonly termed bibliomania.
Frederick Seidel is an American poet known for his distinctive voice, often characterized by his dark, ironic, and provocative style. Seidel's work frequently explores themes of power, privilege, and human desire, with a particular focus on the complexities of the modern world. His poems often reflect a detached, almost voyeuristic perspective on society.
Shirley Hazzard is one of the most singular, erudite, and elegant prose writers to have lived.
Located in Mexico City, the Biblioteca Vasconcelos is one of the most striking libraries in the world. Designed by architect Alberto Kalach and inaugurated in 2006, this "megalibrary" spans over 38,000 square meters, making it a centerpiece of knowledge and design.
The Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry is the most famous and possibly the best surviving example of manuscript illumination in the late phase of the International Gothic style. It is a book of hours: a collection of prayers to be said at the canonical hours. It was created between c. 1412 and 1416 for the extravagant royal bibliophile and patron John, Duke of Berry, by the Limbourg brothers.
The Roxburghe Club is a bibliophilic and publishing society based in the United Kingdom. The spur to the Club's foundation was the sale of the enormous library of the Duke of Roxburghe, which took place over 46 days in May–July 1812. The auction was eagerly followed by bibliophiles, the high point being the sale on 17 June 1812 of the first dated edition of Boccaccio's Decameron, sold to the Marquis of Blandford for £2,260, the highest price ever given for a book at that time. The Club has had a total of 350 members from its foundation to 2017. The circle has always been an exclusive one, with just one "black ball" (negative vote) being enough to exclude an applicant. Since 1839 the number of members at any one time has been limited to forty.