The Dead Sea Scrolls

     “The Dead Sea Scrolls!” my client exclaimed when I showed him the “before” photograph of Bible pages, shredded from 30 years of use, laid out on my worktable. Then I handed him his mother’s study Bible with the pages restored and resewn, her handwritten notes peeled away from the laminated flyleaf and included in the new endpaper attachment, and a new leather cover with the same look and feel as the original. He paid me for my work, of course, but his amazement and gratitude were also a meaningful part of my compensation.

        Bookbinding, like writing, is a solitary occupation. When I apply sentences to an empty page, hoping they will come to life and reveal something true, I’m thinking and working alone in a room. When I apply Japanese tissue to a torn page, with a pile of damaged pages yet to restore, I experience the same kind of hope.

Lincoln’s Devotional

 

My friend Cathy loves Civil War history. When I found a facsimile of Lincoln’s Devotional* at Wonder Book, it seemed a perfect gift if only I could make a special cover for it. However, I would be seeing her the next day at her home near the Gettysburg battlefield, so I couldn’t do a traditional binding. (I’m no good at all-nighters.) Then I envisioned a battle-weary soldier reading his Bible or devotional book by firelight, the book protected with a rustic scrap of leather. My leather stash had a piece with an untrimmed edge. After refining my design with a paper template, I cut the leather and adhered a paper liner with wheat paste. I wrapped the book first with plastic wrap to prevent moisture migration, then in the slightly-damp leather, and swaddled the whole thing with an elastic bandage overnight. The next morning, the leather had dried and fitted itself to the book. The book’s back cover slips under an inside paper strip and the natural flap slides through two parallel lines cut into the front. The simple binding complements her Civil War re-enactments, and the pages contain the same spiritual truths that Lincoln found.

*The Believer’s Daily Treasure, London: The Religious Tract Society, 1852

James Hayday’s Bible

 

 

This 1848 Bible appears to have been left open on a flat surface for years (decades?). The text block was completely broken in half lengthwise, held together only by the cracked leather spine glued directly to the backs of the signatures. As I began the repair process, I told my friend and bookbinding mentor, Linda, “Getting that spine off was like getting bark off a log!” I even emailed my client that the original binder must have intended his work to last for the ages and just didn’t know that his materials would fail.

            I felt I was getting to know the binder through his craftsmanship. During difficult portions of the repair, I assured him I was doing my best to honor his skill. (If you’ve read my previous entries, you know already that I talk out loud while I’m working.) Finally I paid attention to the small gold letters stamped along the bottom edge of the cover pastedown: “Bound by Hayday.” The binder’s biography on Wikipedia confirmed what I had already sensed about him.

            “HAYDAY, JAMES (1796–1872), book-binder, born in London in 1796…. To make the back tight he dispensed with the ordinary backing of paper, and fastened the leather cover down to the back. [Boy did he fasten it.]… Works bound by Hayday became famous, and his name attached to a book raised its value twenty-five per cent…. Unable to compete with other and cheaper binders, he was adjudicated a bankrupt on 10 June 1861.”

            So Mr. Hayday was a craftsman, not a businessman, and apparently didn’t charge enough for time and materials invested. How many of us can relate? You can read the complete entry on Wikipedia or in the Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 25.

            I can imagine that Mr. Hayday fretted about his business failure. Did he have hope that his work would stand the test of time? All I know is that his craftsmanship remains a palpable presence that spans 165 years, from the time the book left his hands in the mid-19^th century till my hands reverse-engineered parts of it in the 21^st century.

Holes book with Joe pop-up

 

 

Our neighbor Joe across the street continues the sympathetic remodeling of his Colonial-era house, which has had several owners in the past decade. After he read that treasures could be unearthed in early-American outhouse pits, he located a depression in the grass behind his house and started digging. We razzed him while he added to the growing pile of what looked like dirt. Sure enough, he discovered broken china, the pattern identical to that of the china in Thomas Jefferson’s kitchen at Monticello (apparently the dishes were purchased at the Wal-Mart of its time). He also found antique pharmacy bottles etched by soil acid into sea-glass translucency. I took photos one day and then had an idea. I bought the Louis Sachar young-adult novel “Holes” at Wonder Book and brought it home to do some book art. Joe let me take a rubbing from one of the bottles, fortunately without asking why. I carved three interior holes—one for Joe, one for a bottle, and one for a magnet—and lined them with brown Japanese paper. After mounting the photos of Joe onto both sides of a foamcore piece, I backed it with a strip of that springy, tough plastic that makes packages so hard to open. The cover stays closed due to the magnets sunk into the cover and second interior page, but when the book is opened—Joe pops up. I gave it to him as his housewarming gift.

True Confessions of a Bookbinder

I did something I never thought I'd do: I destroyed a book to make a book.

At work, when customers ask for "a book about birds" and I know they're just going to cut it up for prints, my steps drag as I take them to the Birds aisle. We have a gazillion prints shelved in the back, but that section is not for the faint of heart.

Over the past two years, a friend wrote a series of beautiful meditations on suffering that drew on imagery from the Hubble photographs to explore the greatness of God. When I decided to create a one-of-a-kind physical book for her, I found myself with an Olfa silver in hand, cutting out pages from a stunning book called "Star Vistas: A Book of Fine Art Astrophotography." I reasoned that the ends justified the means. But I still apologized (out loud, even) to the book with every cut.

I had tried to download & print images from the Hubble photos online, but my little printer couldn't really handle the job. The fine coated paper and gorgeous detail of the printed book were simply the only way to do justice to the project.

I did buy three more "Star Vistas" and gave two of them as Christmas gifts, unmutilated. And of course, I kept one for myself.

Reconnect with the joy - Flying Dog book

In between family Bibles, I am playing. For a former coworker who loves beer, I decided to create a pop-up book as a wedding gift. I'm no paper engineer, so I used a well-engineered product. The book can be a guest book, photo album, beer-bottle display.... whatever! I strengthened the inside moving parts with PVA and cloth tape, sewed pages to an accordion spine, and added an outside spine of bonded leather. The bottle-cap closure holds its place with a strong little magnet taped to the inside front. Velcro keeps up the bottom flaps until they're needed.

12 Rules For Bookbinders

I'm still working on the Heritage Society Bibles, a project that has had numerous interruptions. For now, here's a text-only post.

12 RULES FOR BOOKBINDERS

1. First, do no harm.
2. If you meet resistance, find out why.
3. It's better to have a good mend than a bad match.
4. If you get tense or stressed, take a break and tidy your work area.
5. Food and drink nourish body and soul, but they don't belong in your workspace.
6. Don't overdo. "A little more" can be too much.
7. Don't panic. When you make a mistake, nobody dies.
8. Build reversibility into your process.
9. Charge what you're worth.
10. Find a mentor. Ask questions. Join a mentoring group.
11. Consider the value of your work and don't scrimp on the quality of your materials.
12. Reconnect with the joy.

(c) 2010 Tawn O'Connor with contributions from The Book Arts List