If you see this you’re legally obligated to reblog and tag with the book you’re currently reading
art blog(derogatory)

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dirt enthusiast
RMH
Xuebing Du
we're not kids anymore.
almost home
DEAR READER
taylor price
Claire Keane
styofa doing anything
Not today Justin
wallacepolsom

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tannertan36
will byers stan first human second
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oozey mess

#extradirty
todays bird

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@ialwayshaveabook
If you see this you’re legally obligated to reblog and tag with the book you’re currently reading
Pride and Prejudice Art
A few recent scene redraws from the 2005 Pride and Prejudice film! One of my favorite movies ever.
Prints available in my shop!
I’ve been on a big Jane Austen kick this year and currently reading my way through all the books! So far I’ve read Emma, Pride and Prejudice, Persuasion, and I’m almost finished with Northanger Abbey!
How To Solve Your Own Murder by Kristen Perrin
“Don’t worry, Annie, I’m not going to murder you.’
‘I appreciate that, Saxon,’ I reply. ‘I’m not going to murder you either.’ And then we both smile, because this is such a strange thing to say ten minutes after meeting someone for the first time.”
the tiniest of sketches for the glorious 25th of may
gnu, sir terry.
chiron asking annabeth to weave percy’s shroud while he’s on ogygia and they think he’s dead. annabeth weaving obsessively during the day because it gives her something to focus on even if everyone is concerned about how she throws herself into it, no food no sleep no breaks. then every night she frantically unweaves it because no shroud means no funeral and if they don’t burn it, he’s not actually dead. finally finishing it just about to burn it and percy shows up and she feels relief because she knewwww it. percy and annabeth taking turns mirroring odysseus and penelope oh lord make me normal about them
percy jackson & annabeth chase
As long as we’re together.
Genuinely, one of the measures that's stopped book banning the most when districts implement it, is having the would-be banners fill out a form that demonstrates if they've read the book or not. Like where they have the summarize the plot and characters and do a mini book report and give a review. It stops them in their tracks. This is why in my high school, every time someone wanted to ban a book it ended up going nowhere. There was one where a conservative student wanted to ban the manga "Legal Drug" for having a marijuana leaf on the cover, then got the form that required them to actually read and either balked, or read it and realized it was not pro-drug at all. (The other one that reduces book bans even further is "requiring the would-be banner to be affiliated with this actual school in some way, either by being a student, faculty/staff or a parent of a child at the school" because the vast majority of bans are "activists" with no affiliation with the school who just travel around trying to do this in districts all over the U.S. IIRC a few years ago someone crunched the numbers and just 51 parents were responsible for all the book bans that year nationally. 51! In a country with 50 states, with over 300 million people total!)
Yesterday I said that bookmobiles are an instant reblog. Today, I learned that rule also applies to book donkeys.
BIBLIOBURRO
i think it’s really important that everyone knows that this man (Luis Soriano) has his own children’s books
and the donkeys are called Alfa and Beto, by the way. if you even care
Another fun fact on the subject: “Biblio” in “biblioburro” is a root word in the word “biblioteca” (library in Spanish and Portuguese) and means “book” in Latin.
So “biblioburro” literally translates as “book donkeys.”
To hatch a crow, a black rainbow
Bent in emptiness
over emptiness
But flying
—Ted Hughes, Crow: From the Life and Songs of the Crow
[ID: a series of tweets by @/SketchesbyBoze they read:
"I review books for a living, and I’ve noticed a worrying trend of what I call “instagramming the Holocaust.” (1 / 9)"
"Bestselling novels about the Holocaust tend to be “uplifting” and sentimental. They have romantic subplots. Jewish characters only exist to be rescued by the (often American) protagonist. The cinematic, three-act structure culminates in a redemptive ending."
"What these books offer (and they sell in the millions) is a sanitized version of the Shoah in which brave Americans bravely battle Hitler, the reader learns a lesson about Kindness and Not Being Prejudiced, and there are no sticky questions about who did the killings, and why."
"Jewish novelist Dara Horn has observed that memoirs and novels written by actual Holocaust survivors typically don’t sell—because there are no pat resolutions, no redemptions, no heartwarming moments where the Jewish prisoners see the good in their Nazi captors."
"Anne Frank’s (excellent) diary became the entry point into the Holocaust for most of us because she had not yet experienced the worst of it – because she hadn’t yet learned that some people aren’t “truly good at heart.” It’s just safe enough not to disturb us."
"And we love “uplifting” Holocaust novels because we don’t want to be disturbed, not really. This is the real reason why books like Maus offend the sensibilities of middle-class parents, because they bear witness to a truth about human nature that we don’t want to confront."
"And the “message” of the Holocaust is not that people are truly good, or that we need to be kind and tolerant (though that is true). The message is that six million people were murdered, and millions of ordinary folk were complicit, and millions of others looked away."
"This compulsion to sanitize the past, to sanitize the world, is one of the overlooked roots of white nationalism. We want to seal ourselves away from the experiences of others because we fear what they might say to us. We want reality to be pastel-hued and instagram-filtered."
"If you feel the need to shield your children from history that’s upsetting and “inappropriate,” examine yourself. If you need your stories to have positive morals and tidy endings, examine yourself. If you live in a pastel bubble, examine yourself, because the bubble is toxic." end ID.]
There was a book I read and ended up reading more than once.
It is one of those books that does not really get talked about and that Hollywood will never be interested in.
It is painful read. Potentially triggering read.
It is about a Jewish woman who is married to a Nazi officer.
She was able to hide her identity by using a friends identity. She was working as a red cross nurse and when she met her first husband. She did tell him she was Jewish and he hid that. That was the only kind thing he did.
He was abusive and cruel and she was trapped. She could not just leave as that was not really an option for her as Jewish woman hiding her identity married to a Nazi officer who knew that.
If you can read it I think you should again keeping in mind of potential triggers. It is called the Nazi Officer's Wife by Edith Hahn-Beer and it is about Edith Hahn-Beer's story.
When these Hollywood type of stories, the best seller list type of stories are created the are made up and not true.
They also hide the actual truth of what was going on. The loss, destruction of families, the destruction of love that already existed, and the horrific amounts rape and sexual assault done to adults and children as well as sexual slavery.
Not only that it sends a message about what love is worthy and who is worthy of being seen as heroic. There many stories of heroes in the Holocaust. And far too many of them are not often talked about because the heroes are Jews.
There are also stories that are about love enduring in the Holocaust about Jewish love finding a way and enduring.
Romantic love and also familial love and platonic love and love of Judaism. There are many stories of love of different kinds finding a way to endure.
But those don't get showcased and told because everyone in those stories are Jews. Jews who behave like Jews, sound like Jews, do things is a very Jewish way, you know Jews being Jews and that just isn't marketable.
In the actual stories, the real stories, the true stories there is love, there is pain, there loss, there is the rawness and complexity that real life has because it is real. It is stories about real people.
And we also see in these stories the big ways and little ways that Jews fought back, the big and little rebellions Jews had, because this idea that Jews just went like meek sheep to slaughter is a myth.
We have never been meek. We did not just accept dying, we did not just take it.
Rather at some point many Jewish people were surrounded by so much death during the Holocaust that it broke them to see it and know it. Which is very understandable. The psychological toll that those conditions had on them broke people's spirit and took away any though of fighting back.
But no one started off that way. They had to be brought to that point, that had to be conditioned to get to that state.
And all of that never gets told. Rather what gets told is made up stories to make children and grandchildren of the world who knew what was happening and decided that as long it was happening to the Jews and Romani it was not their problem feel better.
I just finished The Three Musketeers, and this might be the best book I've ever read in my life, mostly because every single character is batshit insane and drunk for 90% of their Big Plot Decisions. Lights up on d'Artagnan: he's new in town and he's already making enemies. He meets his three best friends by scheduling back to back duels with them, under the assumption that he won't have to fight the last two if he dies in the first one. He is twenty years old and has never even heard of a frontal cortex. This is made evident by every word he says. Athos, Porthos, and Aramis are supposedly in their 20s-30s, but barely any better. The moment they have any money at all, they siphon it directly into their alcohol budget. They make enemies everywhere they go and get into almost as many duels as d'Artagnan. Also worth mentioning: they see this crazed 20-year-old and choose to devote their lives to him simply because he has good vibes. We've got the cardinal, who seems only tangentially related to any kind of clergyhood. We've got the king, whose main personality trait is that he HATES his wife. We've got the queen, whose main personality trait is cheating on her husband. We've got the Duke of Buckingham, who is (unfortunately) English. We've got the Love of d'Artagnan's Life, aka somebody else's wife but he sucks so he can get cuckolded. And finally, we've got the prototype female manipulator, a character written with such intense feminism AND misogyny that I scarcely know what to say about her except "go off, queen" as well as the occasional "I don't support all women, some of you are stupid." Do yourself a favor and commit 5-12 weeks to reading this book, if for no other reason than the part where d'Artagnan tells a guy "I'll spring you from jail, don't worry, it's all part of the plan!" and then immediately forgets him in prison and flirts with his wife.
𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐁𝐚𝐜𝐤 𝐔𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐚𝐫𝐲 𝐁𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐃𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 (𝐓𝐡𝐞𝐲 𝐖𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐍𝐞𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐚𝐫𝐲 𝐓𝐨 𝐌𝐞)
Bring back illustrations in books.
I want full page art that makes me pause mid-sentence and go “oh.”
Bring back little drawings at the start of chapters. Bring back weird decorative headers. Bring back maps that are slightly confusing but I will stare at them like I’m planning a military campaign anyway.
Where is my glossary. Where is my pronunciation guide. I am tired of guessing. I want to know if I’ve been saying a name wrong for 300 pages so I can feel betrayed properly.
Give me marginalia. Give me fake documents. Letters. Diagrams that look important but are emotionally suspicious. Let the book look like it’s been handled.
Why did we decide everything had to be Just Text. Who voted for this. Show yourself-
I want footnotes that feel like the author is whispering additional lore directly into my ear. I want diagrams that explain nothing and somehow make everything worse.
Give me endpapers with art. Give me symbols that repeat until I start connecting dots like a conspiracy theorist. Give me one illustration halfway through that alters my brain chemistry permanently.
Books used to come with bonus content like they were slightly haunted objects and now we’re just… behaving? No.
If I am committing to 300 pages, I deserve enrichment.
Let the text do things. Let it shift. Let it breathe. Give me a page that’s just one line in the center so I can sit there like I’ve been personally attacked.
We have the technology. We have the printing capabilities. Why are we acting like books have to behave.
Also imagine the DRAMA. A character dies and suddenly the chapter header symbol changes. A map detail you ignored becomes relevant. A little drawing you thought was decorative is actually foreshadowing. Hello???
Anyway this is my formal petition to make books a little more unhinged again. Add the art. Add the maps. Add the weird glossary entries.
This is not a want. This is a need. Publishers, please let books be weird again- I AM BEGGING
"Using an Oxford comma is a sign of AI"
bestie boo, let me fill you in on something: if you're going to take any part of 'good grammar' and randomly assign it to She's A Witch! AI, you might as well give up. It's over. You're cooked. Anyone who has spent the last decade or more learning to type properly, anyone who has spent any time writing articles/papers/essays that require you to use 'good grammar' is going to fall into that 'oh no it might be AI' trap.
Stop hunting like it's 1692. You're not going to find Goody Proctor at the ChatGPT sacrament. What you're going to do is exactly what happened back then: harming people who've done nothing wrong.
𝘐 𝘸𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘴𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘭𝘪𝘧𝘦𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘯 𝘧𝘢𝘤𝘦 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘢𝘨𝘦𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘭𝘥 𝘢𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘦
Spoke to a gen z person the other night and apparently the young folks don't know about the very legal sites from which you can access public domain media (including Dracula, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and other Victorian gothic horror stories)?
Like this young person didn't even know about goddamn Gutenberg which is a SHAME. I linked to it and they went "aw yiss time to do a theft" and I was like "I mean yo ho ho and all that, sure, but. you know gutenberg is entirely legal, right?"
Anyway I'm gonna put this in a few Choice Tags (sorry dracula fans I DID mention it though so it's fair game) and then put some Cool Links in a reblog so this post will still show UP in said tags lmao.
Spreading the news to my followers - if you weren’t aware of this before, here’s the link to Project Gutenberg - https://www.gutenberg.org/
Project Gutenberg is a gigantic collection of books that are in the public domain. You can read the books through the site or you can download them in various formats so you can get the format you prefer for your eReader of choice.
It is free.
It is legal.
I was reviewing the list of the top 100 books downloaded yesterday and I saw a fair few that I had to read for college classes - so if you’re a college student and your professor assigns you to read Plato or any number of older works, check here before you buy a copy.
I reread the Anne series several years back - they were free through this. I need to reread Pride and Prejudice at least once a year, and my e-book version is from this. Someone recommended Jekyll and Hyde to me a few weeks back and I got a free copy from this. When I went to Haworth on my last holiday before the plague times, I brought books by the Bronte sisters with me to read or reread that I downloaded from here. It’s a great resource.
Yes yes yes! I was honestly so flabbergasted that this young person hadn't heard of the gutenberg project! It's been around for AGES, maybe longer than the kindle has? And it's such a huge project and wonderful resource! It used to be a household name (or maybe that's just my family, thanks to my dad being a cheapskate nerd [affectionate]). I was so glad to be able to share this resource and others with them though, and I wanted to make sure no one else was missing out!
If you look at the first reblog from me I also recommended a few other resources, most of which were from www.archive.org, home of the Wayback Machine! They run openlibrary.org, where you can check out ebooks of some public domain titles! They even have the Bone series by Jeff Smith!
And archive.org itself has all kinds of public domain media including music and movies! For Dracula fans, here's a radio show adaptation of the book, starring Orson Welles! And here's a 1920 movie adaptation of "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," starring John Barrymore, the grandfather of Drew Barrymore!
I'm so excited to see people falling in love with classic media through Dracula Daily! Let's keep that fire blazing!
Also, if you can't handle reading things, check out libirvox.org! it's a free audio book project taking public domain works and people doing free audiobooks! there's a lot of great stuff on there, but it takes things in the public domain and makes audio books out of them!
it's a super nice project, and you can find some really nice readers there!
Also don't think a book is old because it's in the public domain
lots of writers and publishers are prepared to waive future profits for entirely petty reasons
because of this the entire works of Philip K Dick [petty writer who found himself with lots of hangers on during his life] and HP Lovecraft [his publisher - who was his wife and hated him] became public domain on their death
Sherlock Holmes entered public domain this year, it's always worth checking because you can save a fortune
and the more popular the classic - the more likely someone has uploaded it
Also don’t think a
book is old because it’s in
the public domain
Beep boop! I look for accidental haiku posts. Sometimes I mess up.
Want audiobooks instead?
LibriVox has free public domain audiobooks.
Public domain works in the US are:
Anything published (in the US) from 1927 or earlier (this number goes up every year for quite a while), and
Anything published between 1928 and 1963 that wasn't renewed, and
Anything published before 1989 without a proper copyright notice.
(Don't go looking for things in that third category unless you've studied a LOT about copyright law. Mostly that covers things like "weird little newsletters" and "self-published booklets" and sometimes fanzines. But most publications have a copyright notice in them.)
There's also some oddball exemptions here and there; copyright law is a tentacled mess. But those are the basic guidelines. (Except for audio. Audio has its own set of rules. It's weird.) (I mentioned tentacles, did I not? Double the amount of them you were thinking of.)
There are a lot of works from the 50s and early 60s that were not renewed, especially short stories published in magazines.
Project Gutenberg began in 1971; the first text was the US Declaration of Independence, shared through the university computer system. That was the start of "hey computers + public domain text = FREE BOOKS FOR EVERYONE."
Adding on that Project Gutenberg is not just Eng language texts either! I know specifically about the French texts because I did independent study French lit in high school and all my sources were Project Gutenberg acquired (Candide my beloathed) but there's many open source texts available in a number of languages.
browsing the top 100 books downloaded in the last 30 days can be really fun too, interesting to see how things change
https://www.gutenberg.org/browse/scores/top#books-last30
Oh man, yeah, young people definitely need to learn this. I read so many public domain things when I was fresh out of college and penniless but still needed entertainment. Just going straight to Wikisource works too:
And yes, Sherlock Holmes is in the public domain. But I got bored with Sherlock Holmes after a few months, and became much more pumped when I discovered his mirror opposite, Arsene Lupin. Because when you're not only young and penniless but living through the Great Recession, what you really want to read about isn't the world's greatest detective solving crimes. It's the world's greatest thief robbing fat cats blind while pantsing the police along the way.
And you can Ctrl-F find words in electronic texts.
This is so powerful that in the old times they made a whole-ass index of every word in the Bible, called a concordance. It is now possible for every electronic book