In my article on Edgar Ederheimer in this present 60th anniversary issue of Biblionews I refer to two coincidences in respect to Dr Nic Witton and his family, originally named Witkowski. In my 2005 Insel article I hypothesised momentarily, on p. 68, that it might have been a certain Hans Schmoller who had transmitted the concept of the illustrated Insel books to the Penguin publishers that gave rise to the King Penguins, but dropped the hypothesis on the grounds that he had only joined Penguin ten years after the King Penguins began to appear.
Category: 2007-12
Since the publication of my article “From the Little Island Books of Leipzig to the King Penguins of London” in the 346th Issue of Biblionews for June 2005, pp. 43–72, there have been three developments that merit comment.
Our Victorian Editor, Richard Overell, has sent the following email: “Could you please mention the recent publication of The World of the Book by Des Cowley and Clare Williamson (Melbourne, Miegunyah Press, 2007). This is a beautifully illustrated, informative account of the highlights of the State Library of Victoria’s rare book collection and accompanies their permanent exhibition, ‘The Mirror of the Book’. It is available for purchase at $59.95 and is great value at that price both for oneself as a book collector and as a Christmas gift.”
Bibliophiles at Oxford is subtitled “A Celebration of Fifty Years of the Oxford University Society of Bibliophiles”. The Society was established in 1950 as a club for undergraduates who had an interest in collecting books and manuscripts. Regular talks and visits were held every year until Trinity Term 2000.Since then the Society has been bibliographically resting, so to speak, “due chiefly to the difficulty of maintaining a committee of student officers”. This is a sad, if understandable situation, as most students have moved into the digital environment, while the cost of antiquarian and manuscript material for purchase moves out of the reach of most of them.