The Hollow Earth, 1964

The Exquisite Corpse Adventure

The Library of Congress has recently revamped their literacy outreach website in anticipation of the 9th annual edition of the National Book Festival. The new read.gov site contains tons of classic texts you can read/browse with an all new fancy page-turning technology. Also on the site is the LOC’s own creation, “The Exquisite Corpse Adventure” (long title: “The Exquisite Corpse Adventure: A Very Unusual and Completely Amazing Story Pieced Together Out of So Many Parts That It Is Not Possible To Describe Them All Here So Go Ahead and Just Start Reading.”)

Exquisite Corpse Adventure

In name, this collaborative writing project harkens back to the original Surrealist exquisite corpse game, which was in turn based on an old Victorian parlour game called Consequences. Our more modern Mad Libs owe a huge debt to these games, as these games provide methods by which a collection of words (or images) are collectively assembled in some sequential manner. The LOC’s Exquisite Corpse Adventure will have 26 chapters contributed by famed authors of children’s books.

I think this is a supremely cool idea to get kids interested in reading, writing, and the power of collaboration with friends and peers, whether it be in a serious artistic endeavor, or just to prove that your creativity can be augmented tremendously just by rappin’ with your pals. Some of my more treasured memories center around collaborative writing activities: working on a newspaper column with my pal Billy, the word games our creative writing club used to play in High School, penning a dirty Mad Lib with friends, relieving bathroom boredom with roommates in college (in word/picture form), collaborating on a zine, working on a goofy short story with a friend by swapping back and forth each sentence, etc. I can only hope that innovative literacy projects like this one will help inspire new generations of young people to new forms of creativity.

Selections from Herra Koipeliinin, 1923

I bought this nifty old Finnish children’s book at a library sale in the 1990s. I got it when I was really into Scandinavian punk/ hardcore music, and was thinking it would be cool to learn Swedish or Finnish. Once I looked at this book, I abandoned all hope for Finnish because it just looks pretty much incomprehensible with all the double vowel nonsense. I did buy a “Teach Yourself Swedish” book around the same time as this book, but I think I only cracked the first chapter or two before I got frustrated and threw in the towel.

In Soviet Union, World’s Fair Exhibit YOU!

From the Official Guidebook of the 1939 New York World’s Fair:

“Visit the Soviet Pavilion and become acquainted with the 170 million people of the Soviet Union in their daily life, their work and their achievements in the first Socialist country in the world.”

The Soviet Union was one of sixty nations who participated in the Hall of Nations at the 1939 World’s Fair. Each participating country had their own pavilion, complete with exhibits, artifacts, performances, and food. Visiting the pavilion was to be an ersatz approximation of a visit to the country itself; it was to be both educational and entertaining. This is precisely where the EPCOT World Showcase concept comes from. In fact, the guidebook says the following, and these words could have came from the pen of Walt Disney himself:

Selections from Teenage Living

One of the many things I collect are old teen advice books, especially ones geared towards describing “proper behavior” in girls. These are the printed analogue to the mental hygiene film, another form of  “social guidance” for the young that covered topics such as manners, dating, sex, money, driving, eating, and grooming.  Teenage Living (published in 1960) covers pretty much all of these topics with winning, old fashioned flair.

The cover itself says so much. This girl is getting so much simultaneous male attention that she has no choice but to bury her face in her hands.  She doesn’t know what direction to bat her eyelashes or flip her hair. The boys on the other hand, look calm, cool, collected..downright languid. They’re just oozing 15 yr. old boy sex appeal!

Chinese comic book

I picked this item up at a library booksale. I don’t speak Mandarin or Cantonese, and therefore am totally clueless as to the actual written content of this book. But, I think we can ascertain a couple things just by looking at a few choice pages….

G.I. Report from Iran: It’s Cold and Expensive and Strange

Published in The Best from Yank: The Army Weekly, (Armed Services Edition), 1945. Click the pages to enlarge.

SOMEWHERE IN IRAN—It there’s any truth to the old proverb, “Early to bed, early to rise,” Gls in Iran (Persia to you) are going to be mighty healthy, wealthy, and wise. Reason: there’s an 8 o’clock curfew that sends the sidewalks scurrying out of sight, closes the bistros and cabarets, and drives the doglaces to bed.

Edson Electro-Magnetic Garter

How Can I Gain In Self-Confidence, Self-Reliance?

Poodles-a-Go-Go

A Marvelous Doll

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