The New Old Book Collectors | Hacker News Reader

The New Old Book Collectors

nytimes.com

35 pointswallflower28 comments

Random musings: I collect “old books” and have for years. My excitement for the hobby changed about two years ago when I was watching a Sotheby’s auction dismantle an epic collection that was a life’s passion and work to assemble of autographed first editions from some of the greatest writers of the 20th century.

The problem with the hobby is that you can’t experience them (I rarely touch them and don’t let others) and perfect replicas are available online for free. Watching the auction, I realized that my kids won’t love this as much as I do and then they’ll just pawn it off just like what I was watching happen.

I’ve moved on to collecting anime Cels among other things. Unfortunately those have a shelf life! Still enjoyable though… It’s one of the few collectibles that actually is a piece of the original.

Why a shelf life? Do the cels deteriorate?

They’re painted with paint that only needs to last weeks, at most. Depending on the exact choice of materials, you might see off-gassing, buckling, the paint flaking off, yellowing, fading, etc. It will all happen on a different timeline. I know old Disney cels could often last a long time, other studios used materials that were comparatively less archival.

Interesting.

Has anyone done the time lapse video of a cel fading out. I'm imagining against a window in an old warehouse or something.

I think you just created a YouTube channel for an enterprising artist Part 1: paints cell then Part 2: cell gets destroyed in window during time lapse, then it could evolve even more testing different paints/paint brands/colours.

I'd watch a handful of them.

I made an account just to respond to you(I'm a 100% lurker). I collect old (pre-1900) books not because I look for financial profit or an increase in value, but to preserve literature- especially older books that are less likely to have been scanned.

What I usually do is I look for books that are on their last threads or are so old they likely won't survive much more abuse of time and tear- and scan/upload them so that they can survive as digital copies long after they turn into dust and mulch on my low-income bookshelves I made myself.

I don't expect these works to survive much longer- much like the memories those older than me will disappear forever after they die soon(most people don't record their lives). So I do what I can to preserve the memories of the past by cloning them into shareable media.

To me, once it's been uploaded- their antique value still remains the same, other people just get to have python-translated pdf/txt formats of the genuine physical copy.

Thank you for doing this. I produce PD ebooks as a hobby, and it simply wouldn’t be possible without source scans to reference (and transcribe where needed).

Have you got a favourite “lost” novel?

I just wanted to let you know that what you are doing is appreciated. More than once while researching something, I've been made aware of the fact that individuals making copies, is the most important factor in written works being preserved. It's hard to say how well digital media is going to stack up against paper, but it seems self-evident to me, the more copies, in the more media, the better.

Hi please email ( link in profile ) I probably have several books that fit your description- Collected because I love books and collecting things :) Though not so old, I have my 1939 Grimm's fairy tails sitting next to me. It is in very sad shape, but still magical to me. It was barely 30 years old when I nabbed it from a church rummage sale.

Chiming in to thank you. The access to quality information on the web, specifically Ebooks, is what gives me hope for the future.

I kinda stumbled into rare books over the years, and at some point became aware of how many important texts just disappear because of lack of reprints and copies. It's really sad and remarkable.

You're doing God's work. I do the same with old magazines.

Interesting. Are there any guides you would recommend to get into collecting animation cels? For example, how to avoid fakes?

Re resources: check out this site which has a list of all active places to buy cels and how to maintain them: www.neotokyo.com

Re fakes: The community is good about helping but hard to seek their advice without it tipping your hand. Some very smart members of the discord community. I don’t spend more than $1000 without verifying the frame or scene which captures most issues. I also have strong preference to own the douga + cel.

Lastly, I don’t and wouldn’t buy cels doraemon or Pokémon without it being a full master setup. There is no way to verify a random show of pikachu.

I'm the child of someone who accumulated books, not necessarily old ones but plenty of used ones. You should let people read books, that's the whole point. I often went into his office and pulled books off the shelf to read. If it weren't for that I would have never learned to program or learned a lot of the advanced math I did at an early age. I don't think people appreciate just how nice having easy access to physical books is, especially as a child. This was well after I had easy access to the internet too, modern technology doesn't really change this.

That was maybe true in the past. I was bad at high school math and survived it because I was gifted a really good book by my aunt. Now you have Khan Academy and all sorts of legal and illegal online libraries.

What book were you gifted?

It's not in English. It was a collection of solved examples of every concept.

Not to sound dismissive, but couldn't you specify in a will that a certain set of books is to remain together, or under certain conditions?

In theory yes. Ultimately they need to be in the hands of someone who cares (which in theory the auction accomplishes). Hundred year old books and manuscripts need to be stored in the proper conditions or they deteriorate quickly. My animation cels are in cabinets that control temperature and humidity.

As far as I know, you can set limitations, but they are timelimited. I think you can bequeath the books with limits for anyone alive when you die, or maybe N generations hence.

So, yes, you can. But you cannot prevent your great great grandson from getting the books as a set and promptly auctioning them off

A collection might not be worth much to them. A suggestion might be to have them displayed at your funeral with instructions to bequeath them to attendees as a memento. That's if most attendees know about your collection (that is, would associate old books with you) and their actual value is low enough. A brawl over your one six-figure book wouldn't be the goal

I have a significant personal library (a semi-complete list at https://www.librarything.com/catalog/D.A.Hosek which doesn’t include the rare volumes or the unread ones). It largely reflects my personal interests which shift over time, but there are notable subcollections, like books on the Jesuits, English recusancy, Graham Greene, Evelyn Waugh, J. D. Salinger, typography/lettering/book arts and Jewish DPs. I have made sure that my wife knows (and my kids will know when they're older) that there is a section of books which are likely to have significant value and maybe shouldn’t just get dropped off at the friends of the library sale after I die.

Thank you for posting this. I always enjoy getting to peruse another person's bookshelves, and this is the next best thing.

I had a favorite professor in college who taught a couple courses about modern Catholic literature. He had to move in a hurry, and donated all of his books to his favorite local bookstore. If only I had heard that he did so earlier, I would have gone straight there and asked to see them.

If you enjoy old books, the documentary The Booksellers was enjoyable. Saw it on Kanopy through local library card.

Is kanopy available for non-US viewing or is it a legal requirement that it can only stream for US public library users?

It requires a card from a subscribing library. Not all subscribing libraries are public libraries and not all libraries subscribe. They don’t have exclusive streaming rights to much of their collection, although they often have stuff that no one else will have because their focus tends to be on indie/foreign/documentary films (not exclusively, but largely).

I live in Chicago and signed up to the Chicago Public Library last year for a "virtual library card" and they didn't do anything to authenticate my location or existence. Just throwing that out there...

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