JF Ptak Science Books LLC   Post 785   Blog Bookstore

 A very small part of a large collection that I purchased of the Library of Congress some years ago (the “Pamphlet Collection”, about 90,000 odd, interesting and almost entirely unrelated in their categorization items) was re-connected by me into a subclass of sweet/odd minor history.  The titles needed to start something like The Story of _____, have an interesting cover illustration, and have the subject material be not-common.

I discovered that it was easier and more interesting to arrange this ephemeral material according to categories that would make the items interesting in a group, where the whole was greater and more interesting than the sum of its parts.  And so a popular and slightly terrible Sponges, a Swell Story springs to life as a Duchampian illustration, far more interesting than it could possibly be as a solemn and bad history of sponges told in 32 cramped pages. 

Some other iconoclastic categories in this vein includes pamphlets whose covers have only a printed  “!” or “?” on them,  with the sub-category of mercilessly bizarre and entertaining printed titles with exclamations or questions (like “Better than Dead?” and “Fury!  Money!”). 

And so I share a few of these The Story of pamphlets–there’s really not too much to say about them beyond offering up their cover images, so I’ll let it go at that.