6/16/09
Back from Vacation
And reading Howell's "A Modern Instance" - review to follow soon. After that it's "Hitler and the Aesthetics of Power." Taking three online classes at present which is slowing down my writing productivity somewhat. Over the summer hoping to polish off 7-8 classes in total to update my web and software knowledge.
5/25/09
Book Story: So You Love Physics
Self-published in 1948, browned with age, "So You Love Physics" is a refutation of the existence of the electron. At first glance this little pamphlet, which turned up in a box lot, seemed nothing remarkable, no different than what one can now find advertised in the Harper's classifieds, where various lunatics claim to have secret knowledge they will share with you for a price. But a little research turned up a bizarre story indeed.
The author of the pamphlet, Bayard Peakes, born in Maine in 1922, served in World War II, was wounded, and discharged as mentally ill (but not needing hospitalization). A student of physics and a member of the American Physical Society (APS), in late 1951 or early 1952 he submitted the paper for presentation at the society's next meeting. The paper was of course rejected by the Secretary of the APS, Karl Darrow (also head of Bell Labs). On July 14, 1952, Peakes came to Columbia University looking for Darrow, gun in hand. Entering the offices of the APS, he was angered to find no physics professors about -- only an 18-year old administrative secretary, Eileen Fahey. He emptied his gun into her and fled.
Named immediately as a possible suspect by an officer of the APS, he was caught a few days later in Boston's Back Bay (coming from a dance). A sensational trial followed; a diagnosis of schizophrenia saved him from the electric chair. Instead, he was sentenced to the Rockland County Asylum. He lived on until 2000.
A twist to this sad tale is that the APS had apparently already changed its mind about accepting Peakes' paper before the murder. According to the APS, the society changed its policy in April 1952, partly due to Peakes' badgering them for months on end, and had ruled that any member could submit abstracts of ten-minute papers, which would not be refused. (This change led directly to a brouhaha in 2006, when a creationist paper was accepted by the APS stating that the big bang never happened, and Peakes' name surfaced once more - although most accounts get the timeline wrong.)
Did Peaks know of the change? Would it have mattered to him? Probably not: He was sick, and the frustration and rejection he had experienced up to then, lmagnified to the nth degree by his condition, likely would have led him down his fatal road regardless.
To back this up, consider that Peakes was also angry about the round rejection of another theory of his by his professors: Newspaper accounts of the time tell of his claim to have discovered the key to human immortality.
Unfortunately, we recognize Peakes' story all too well nowadays. And as one horrific newsflash after another attests, we are as challenged today as 50 years ago in recognizing and responding to the needs of the mentally ill before something terrible occurs.
The book itself: Peakes, Bayard P. So You Love Physics. Self-published, 1948, 33 pages. Stapled wraps. Browned from age, a couple chips to top edge front and back. Printed from typescript with line illustrations. Scarce – OCLC reports four libraries with copies (one of these is in Linus Pauling’s personal library). $75
The author of the pamphlet, Bayard Peakes, born in Maine in 1922, served in World War II, was wounded, and discharged as mentally ill (but not needing hospitalization). A student of physics and a member of the American Physical Society (APS), in late 1951 or early 1952 he submitted the paper for presentation at the society's next meeting. The paper was of course rejected by the Secretary of the APS, Karl Darrow (also head of Bell Labs). On July 14, 1952, Peakes came to Columbia University looking for Darrow, gun in hand. Entering the offices of the APS, he was angered to find no physics professors about -- only an 18-year old administrative secretary, Eileen Fahey. He emptied his gun into her and fled.
Named immediately as a possible suspect by an officer of the APS, he was caught a few days later in Boston's Back Bay (coming from a dance). A sensational trial followed; a diagnosis of schizophrenia saved him from the electric chair. Instead, he was sentenced to the Rockland County Asylum. He lived on until 2000.
A twist to this sad tale is that the APS had apparently already changed its mind about accepting Peakes' paper before the murder. According to the APS, the society changed its policy in April 1952, partly due to Peakes' badgering them for months on end, and had ruled that any member could submit abstracts of ten-minute papers, which would not be refused. (This change led directly to a brouhaha in 2006, when a creationist paper was accepted by the APS stating that the big bang never happened, and Peakes' name surfaced once more - although most accounts get the timeline wrong.)
Did Peaks know of the change? Would it have mattered to him? Probably not: He was sick, and the frustration and rejection he had experienced up to then, lmagnified to the nth degree by his condition, likely would have led him down his fatal road regardless.
To back this up, consider that Peakes was also angry about the round rejection of another theory of his by his professors: Newspaper accounts of the time tell of his claim to have discovered the key to human immortality.
Unfortunately, we recognize Peakes' story all too well nowadays. And as one horrific newsflash after another attests, we are as challenged today as 50 years ago in recognizing and responding to the needs of the mentally ill before something terrible occurs.
The book itself: Peakes, Bayard P. So You Love Physics. Self-published, 1948, 33 pages. Stapled wraps. Browned from age, a couple chips to top edge front and back. Printed from typescript with line illustrations. Scarce – OCLC reports four libraries with copies (one of these is in Linus Pauling’s personal library). $75
5/18/09
Reviews: Manning & Nabokov: The Self in the Story
Finished reading this week: The Middle Parts of Fortune, by Frederic Manning and Glory (Podvig) by Nabokov. A fortuitous pair of books to read side by side: both autobiographical, and in the end suffering from a similar failure.
Manning (1882-1935) was an English-educated Australian with literary work to his credit. Given his education and background, he should have been an officer during WWI, but instead served as a private throughout the war. The Middle Parts of Fortune was issued in an edition of only 520 copies by Peter Davies in 1929 with no author's name (due to its frank language). (Interestingly, he was friends with T. E. Lawrence, who would also serve as an enlisted man in the RAF and Tank Corps in the early 1920's.) The book retells the WWI experiences of a similar well-educated private, named Bourne. The writing is at pains to convey dialect and the simple, monotonous and occasionally deadly life of soldiers along the French front. Many little details add to its realism, although none of the figures except Bourne take on any dimensionality. But it is also a shade too literary and Manning has a tendency to break into bouts of philosophizing that sap the novel's narrative power. Personally, I would recommend in its stead A Brass Hat in No Man's Land by F. P. Crozier, a more sobering, startling WWI story.
Glory (Podvig) by Nabokov (1899-1977) tells the story of the early life of Martin Edelweiss: his earliest childhood in Russia, his youth as an expatriate, stint at Cambridge, and decision to return to his homeland through a feat of high adventure. It was originally published in 1932 in Russian but only translated into English in 1971 (the last of his novels to be translated), with the aid of the author's son. This too is an autobiographical work, as Nabokov himself delineates in his off-putting, third-person foreword. Of course it bears the hallmarks of Nabokov's command of the novel form, but overall it is insular and not memorable.
The failure I mentioned is this: They are readable as lived stories, but when the "live" part ends, they lose their way. The authors go on with their lives; but the fictional selves, as if rivals, must go. It is a certain failure of the imagination, or of nerve. The ending of Fortune - the death of Bourne - is expected, inevitable, and in that it is disappointing. The ending of Glory - the disappearance of Edelweiss in his unnecessary and pointless bid to cross the Russian frontier in secret - is one toward which the book as a whole builds quite unsuccessfully. Indeed it is not enough to bid their other selves adieu, the authors ultimately must savage them - reducing the ever-thinking Bourne to silence in his final moments; ensuring that Edelweiss has none of those qualities which made the author a success. All in all, both books do make for a good object lesson - on the strains and limitations of autobiographical fiction.
About the editions:
Manning, Frederic. The Middle Parts of Fortune, St Martin's Press, 1977. The first widely available copy of the unexpurgated edition. White DJ over blue cloth. (Also more recently republished in an unexpurgated edition as "Her Privates We.")
Nabokov, Vladimir. Glory. McGraw-Hill, 1971. First American edition. A very attractive book: bright yellow DJ, black cloth, and scarlet endpapers.
Manning (1882-1935) was an English-educated Australian with literary work to his credit. Given his education and background, he should have been an officer during WWI, but instead served as a private throughout the war. The Middle Parts of Fortune was issued in an edition of only 520 copies by Peter Davies in 1929 with no author's name (due to its frank language). (Interestingly, he was friends with T. E. Lawrence, who would also serve as an enlisted man in the RAF and Tank Corps in the early 1920's.) The book retells the WWI experiences of a similar well-educated private, named Bourne. The writing is at pains to convey dialect and the simple, monotonous and occasionally deadly life of soldiers along the French front. Many little details add to its realism, although none of the figures except Bourne take on any dimensionality. But it is also a shade too literary and Manning has a tendency to break into bouts of philosophizing that sap the novel's narrative power. Personally, I would recommend in its stead A Brass Hat in No Man's Land by F. P. Crozier, a more sobering, startling WWI story.
Glory (Podvig) by Nabokov (1899-1977) tells the story of the early life of Martin Edelweiss: his earliest childhood in Russia, his youth as an expatriate, stint at Cambridge, and decision to return to his homeland through a feat of high adventure. It was originally published in 1932 in Russian but only translated into English in 1971 (the last of his novels to be translated), with the aid of the author's son. This too is an autobiographical work, as Nabokov himself delineates in his off-putting, third-person foreword. Of course it bears the hallmarks of Nabokov's command of the novel form, but overall it is insular and not memorable.
The failure I mentioned is this: They are readable as lived stories, but when the "live" part ends, they lose their way. The authors go on with their lives; but the fictional selves, as if rivals, must go. It is a certain failure of the imagination, or of nerve. The ending of Fortune - the death of Bourne - is expected, inevitable, and in that it is disappointing. The ending of Glory - the disappearance of Edelweiss in his unnecessary and pointless bid to cross the Russian frontier in secret - is one toward which the book as a whole builds quite unsuccessfully. Indeed it is not enough to bid their other selves adieu, the authors ultimately must savage them - reducing the ever-thinking Bourne to silence in his final moments; ensuring that Edelweiss has none of those qualities which made the author a success. All in all, both books do make for a good object lesson - on the strains and limitations of autobiographical fiction.
About the editions:
Manning, Frederic. The Middle Parts of Fortune, St Martin's Press, 1977. The first widely available copy of the unexpurgated edition. White DJ over blue cloth. (Also more recently republished in an unexpurgated edition as "Her Privates We.")
Nabokov, Vladimir. Glory. McGraw-Hill, 1971. First American edition. A very attractive book: bright yellow DJ, black cloth, and scarlet endpapers.
5/17/09
Fresh Start
Every so often I like to delete all my old blog posts and start over. Many of the books for which I had posted photos have been sold; this summer I'll be posting new photos. I also wanted to write more about the "back story" behind books I find, and post some book reviews and such.
And, I have added an RSS feed to my blog and website for my new favorite selling marketplace, Bonanzle. The marketplace "booth" on Bonanzle is easy to update and maintain, easy for buyers to use, and is searchable through Google and Oodle. The site started from scratch last summer and now has over 2 million listings.
My latest "buy" was 70 books at a recent auction. It was fun to buy boxes of books and then be suprised at the things that turned up when I actually had a chance to look through them. These included a book written by the founder of the modern Finnish sauna movement, an early anti-smoking tract, a scarce pamphlet on New Jersey ghosts, and a giant plate book on New York wines. For myself I picked up an early copy of Melville's poetry and a good dozen readable "books on books" -- early printing, bookbinding, scripts, etc.
Reading: Bought 11 NYRB Classics, 9 of them by Simenon. Just finished his "The Widow," now reading "The Man Who Watched Trains Go By."
And, I have added an RSS feed to my blog and website for my new favorite selling marketplace, Bonanzle. The marketplace "booth" on Bonanzle is easy to update and maintain, easy for buyers to use, and is searchable through Google and Oodle. The site started from scratch last summer and now has over 2 million listings.
My latest "buy" was 70 books at a recent auction. It was fun to buy boxes of books and then be suprised at the things that turned up when I actually had a chance to look through them. These included a book written by the founder of the modern Finnish sauna movement, an early anti-smoking tract, a scarce pamphlet on New Jersey ghosts, and a giant plate book on New York wines. For myself I picked up an early copy of Melville's poetry and a good dozen readable "books on books" -- early printing, bookbinding, scripts, etc.
Reading: Bought 11 NYRB Classics, 9 of them by Simenon. Just finished his "The Widow," now reading "The Man Who Watched Trains Go By."
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