An entirely modern title page design from 1545 by Michel de Vascosan. This could be published today with no layout changes. Astonishing. (Subsequently ruined by a stamp-happy librarian, naturally) #bookdesign #typography

Anyone know what time specifically the rapture's happening?

Pages from the Altar Book published by D. B. Updike’s Merrymount Press in 1896 (when he was still under the spell of William Morris). Borders & initials by Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue Source: archive.org/details/updi...

so better is it to perish in that howling infinite, than be ingloriously dashed upon the lee

Fooled myself with the oldest trick there is this morning, picked up an empty dust jacket thinking it was the whole book 🥲

Peter Kyle once again struggling hard and failing to beat the moron allegations

Sharing this nice manuscript opening because why not (15th C; source: archive.org/details/jbc....)

The tributes were very moving

This week I've been proofreading the index of scholars for the latest volume of the Annual Bibliography of English Lang & Lit, so if you published anything in the field last year, I read your name this week. Always nice to come across friends in there 📃📚

Trying to find a good alternative to Microsoft Planner but they're all infested with 'AI' 😐 (baffled that they think this is such a selling point)

Brontë country

New book contract signed for our Jewelled Tortoise series! 'Sabine Baring-Gould, Mehalah: A Story of the Salt Marshes', edited by Michael Craske (@mjcraske.bsky.social) All info 👉 www.mhra.org.uk/publications...

A 16th-century sonnet sequence, beautifully set in italic (with roman capitals, as was the style at the time) Philippe Desportes, publ. by Robert Mangnier, 1578 archive.org/details/bub_... #bookdesign #typography

I've said it before and will again: AI defenders need to be asked, every time, how they can justify dystopian hell-fodder like this every time they mention any supposed benefits of AI (which I have yet to see any concrete examples of). Do those 'benefits' outweigh this (and the rest)?

And bang on cue the new Green Party leader this morning opens with re-nationalising the water companies. Surely this is a policy everyone can get behind, no matter what your politics?

Southern Water have almost doubled my bill compared to last year, and I have no choice but to pay it. The logic of privatisation, such as it is, requires a competitive market to function. Without competition there is only monopoly and abuse, which is what Southern Water are doing.

This was my desk in 2013 📚 Around a year after I submitted my doctoral thesis; I think I must've been lesson-planning here. What economical use of space! I think perhaps I was a little mad. (Same room as my bed and kitchen and everything else, btw)

🐝🐝🐝 New to the @leverhulme.ac.uk 'Bee-ing Human' book: do watch and share our 7 mins film about Charles Butler's queen bee piping song, recorded in @theul.bsky.social and @peterhousecam.bsky.social with @sjjackson32.bsky.social Magnus Williamson, Richard Wistreich and choir.

I should have tagged @uclssees.bsky.social in this post! (And in the original post)

We're having a book launch for Mirdja in October, come along if you're in or near London! The editors/translators will be talking about this wonderful novel, perhaps reading some passages. It's gonna be fun 😀

England is stored with bridges, hills, and wool, With churches, wells, and women beautiful (Source: archive.org/details/faer...)

Please don’t scribble all over my copy of … oh

He was in his early twenties here, but it was only ten years later that he won an Oscar.

Very excited to work out last night that a copy of Arthur Symons’s translation of Baudelaire I picked up the other day was previously owned by a young Bernard Herrmann. The seller had no idea; to be fair I’m not sure it adds anything to the value, but it’s certainly very cool.

This is great, and I love how the library presents the book as a gallery of title pages, meaning it’s also a nice way of browsing historical book design #occult #bookdesign www.openculture.com/2025/08/2178...

Lovely Art Nouveau cover to a book of prints by Max Klinger (1883)

A Book Peddler, c. 1670-90 www.metmuseum.org/art/collecti...

Coffee and proofs ☕️📑

Found these in a folder related to a forthcoming book; can't remember now whether I chose those helpful filenames myself 🤔

Back from leave in the mountains to only(?) 200 emails and no disasters/crises 😮‍💨

Spent the last week among mountains and lochs and well away from the cares of the world ⛰️

Internet Archive is so efficient it’s already started including works published many thousands of years in the future

Truly unhinged cover concept for a book series!

The book was drenched 😔

Who would have thought one wine glass to have had so much glass in him 🥹

Just learned that Elton John called my local MP a moron, which is fantastic because he really, really is (Also his response was ‘I’ve been called that my whole life’ …umm… take a hint then?)

The lamination on this book cover is damaged in just the right place that in certain lights it looks like Arthur Symons has a snazzy silver earring (and it looks good!)

This week we begin proofing the print volume of the Annual Bibliography of English Lang & Lit, which means I'm reading (again) the title of everything published in the field last year. Always interesting seeing who's publishing on what. Also there's more swearing in it than you might imagine

Very pleased to see this out. It's an absolutely wonderful novel, highly recommended (Zola-esque, I would say, with a slightly more modernist tint). (Of course I would say that, but honestly it's one of my fav works that we've published) 📘 'This is a game out of hell, this life of ours...'

Just ticked off four things from my to do list in one go. I think the Microsoft To Do app's celebratory ding should get louder and more elaborate each time when you check off multiple things at once

In case you haven't seen it already, it's time to stop using WeTransfer to send files: thesocieties.net/blog/2025/07...

'A Tapestry of Nordic Decadence' Barbara Burns talks to Eva Buchwald and Viola Parente-Čapková about their work on 'L. Onerva, Mirdja: A Decadent New Woman', which has just appeared in the MHRA’s Jewelled Tortoise series. 👉 www.mhra.org.uk/news/2025/07...

A beautiful binding for an Aldine edition #bookdesign (I think it's a Grolier but not certain) archive.org/details/guil...

Why is @adobe.com so keen to get me to 'share' PDFs I'm working on? I don't want to, thank you, and when I do I will use email because it works absolutely fine 🤷‍♂️

He saw God’s foot upon the treadle of the loom, and spoke it; and therefore his shipmates called him mad.

Yesterday was so good. Watched the Lionesses win again in the same pub I watched them win in three years ago. Lovely atmosphere and brilliant game. What a great team, love them all 🏆💖

🗣️ Our latest book in the Jewelled Tortoise series is out now! 'L. Onerva, Mirdja: A Decadent New Woman'. Translated by Eva Buchwald with an introduction and notes by Viola Parente-Čapková. 👉 www.mhra.org.uk/publications... Access via @jstor.bsky.social 👉 www.jstor.org/stable/jj.30...

Anyone who defends 'AI' (& even those trotting out that trite line 'ofc there are legitimate uses of AI') should be asked to explain how it justifies 1) the energy/environmental cost, and 2) the harm to legitimate websites

AI bots are once again hammering our website, ignoring safeguards & disguising themselves as legit users, such that we may be forced to consider taking content offline, or making it harder to access. This includes the MHRA Style Guide (which won't be taken offline, but may become harder to access)

One of the many weird & annoying things about the useless 'AI' 'summarize' option that Adobe have forced into their PDF reader is the lack of understanding of the many different types of document there might be. What use is a summary of a bibliography? a catalogue? a ticket? a model release?