Ian Sansom - Paper - An Elegy

From the reviews of Paper: An Elegy :

‘Ian Sansom’s Paper: An Elegy has an intensity that might seem alarming if you didn’t share his obsession … Sansom’s scholarship is prodigious; his enthusiasm inexhaustible … He can make one laugh out loud by his placing of a single word (“Anyway”). He writes that when he dies, he wants to be buried in a paper coffin. And by the time you’ve finished reading this extraordinary book, so will you.’ Jane Shilling, Daily Telegraph

‘He settles on calling his book a “personally curated Paper Museum”, but few curators are so engaging and dynamic.’ Andrew Martin, Financial Times

‘His wonderfully diverting book … is not strictly a history of paper; rather, he invites us to explore it as we might wander around an eccentrically curated museum. One may also imagine it as a vast shoebox stuffed with fascinating facts jotted on a multi tude of scraps shored against paper’s ruin … splendidly dense with fact and thought.’ Steven Poole, Times Literary Supplement

For Nicholas and George , with thanks for Christmas lunch

The old book collector’s pulse was almost visible, throbbing in his wrist and temples. His voice became deeper as he held the book up to his eyes so he could read more clearly. His expression was radiant.

‘A magnificent book,’ confirmed Corso,

dragging on his cigarette.

‘It’s more than that. Feel the paper.’

ARTURO PÉREZ-REVERTE, The Club Dumas (1993)

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Praise Praise Praise Dedication Epigraph RESPECTING PAPER: An Introduction 1. A Miracle of Inscrutable Intricacy 2. In the Wood 3. Walking Papers 4. Victims to the BIBLIOMANIA! 5. Ornamenting the Façade of Hell 6. The Soul of Advertisement 7. Constructive Thinking 8. The Secret is the Paper 9. The Squiggle Game 10. A Wonderful Mental and Physical Therapy 11. Legitimationspapiere 12. Five Leaves Left THE HOLLOW IN THE PAPER: Acknowledgements TEARING THE BOOK INTO PIECES: A Bibliography Text Permissions About the Author By the same Author Copyright About the Publisher From the reviews of Paper: An Elegy : ‘Ian Sansom’s Paper: An Elegy has an intensity that might seem alarming if you didn’t share his obsession … Sansom’s scholarship is prodigious; his enthusiasm inexhaustible … He can make one laugh out loud by his placing of a single word (“Anyway”). He writes that when he dies, he wants to be buried in a paper coffin. And by the time you’ve finished reading this extraordinary book, so will you.’ Jane Shilling, Daily Telegraph ‘He settles on calling his book a “personally curated Paper Museum”, but few curators are so engaging and dynamic.’ Andrew Martin, Financial Times ‘His wonderfully diverting book … is not strictly a history of paper; rather, he invites us to explore it as we might wander around an eccentrically curated museum. One may also imagine it as a vast shoebox stuffed with fascinating facts jotted on a multi tude of scraps shored against paper’s ruin … splendidly dense with fact and thought.’ Steven Poole, Times Literary Supplement

Dedication For Nicholas and George , with thanks for Christmas lunch

Epigraph The old book collector’s pulse was almost visible, throbbing in his wrist and temples. His voice became deeper as he held the book up to his eyes so he could read more clearly. His expression was radiant. ‘A magnificent book,’ confirmed Corso, dragging on his cigarette. ‘It’s more than that. Feel the paper.’ ARTURO PÉREZ-REVERTE, The Club Dumas (1993)

RESPECTING PAPER: An Introduction

1. A Miracle of Inscrutable Intricacy

2. In the Wood

3. Walking Papers

4. Victims to the BIBLIOMANIA!

5. Ornamenting the Façade of Hell

6. The Soul of Advertisement

7. Constructive Thinking

8. The Secret is the Paper

9. The Squiggle Game

10. A Wonderful Mental and Physical Therapy

11. Legitimationspapiere

12. Five Leaves Left

THE HOLLOW IN THE PAPER: Acknowledgements

TEARING THE BOOK INTO PIECES: A Bibliography

Text Permissions

About the Author

By the same Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

Bookplate by Aubrey Beardsley © The Bridgeman Art Library Ltd

First of all, respect your paper!

J.M.W. TURNER’s advice to Mary Lloyd, recollected by her in 1880, quoted in Turner Studies , vol. 4, no. 1 (1984)

Welcome to the Paper Museum. The museum is dedicated to the preservation and study of paper and paper products, including not only – and obviously – books, letters and diaries, but also account ledgers and ballot papers, bandboxes and banderoles, bandages and dressings, bank cheques and ledgers, banners and bunting, beer mats, birth certificates, death certificates, baptism and bastardy papers, board games, bookmarks, business cards, cartons and packaging, menus, bills of fare and cash register receipts, charts (nautical, medical, educational and otherwise), cigarette papers, clothes (including suits, hats, shirts, overcoats, kimonos, overalls and coveralls), coffins, colouring books, confetti, coupons, construction and tracing paper, emery boards, envelopes, filters and gauzes (medical, industrial and culinary), fireworks, flypaper and official forms of all kinds, funeralia, greeting cards, postcards, kites, carpets, lanterns and lampshades, library cards, identity cards and passports, magazines, catalogues, newspapers, maps and globes, paper bags, paper cups, paper dolls, paper flowers, paper money, paper pipes, panoramas, photographs, playing cards, postage stamps, Post-it notes, posters, prescriptions, puzzles, report cards and registers, sandpaper, shoe boxes, stationery, stickers, streamers, tags, labels and tickets, tea bags, telephone directories, wall-paper, wrapping paper, etc., etc., etc.

We live in a paper world. Without paper our lives would be unimaginable. Or almost unimaginable. We can, of course, imagine it, as we can imagine anything, for the great writers and artists and musicians have taught us to imagine, in their books, and their paintings, and through their music. We have been trained by them, educated by them on paper, and through paper, and by paper, to imagine. So it’s easy to imagine a world without paper. Like being dead, or never having been born.

We arise, wash, and go to the toilet – though without toilet paper. We enjoy a bowl of cereal, unpackaged, naturally. Tea: no bags. Coffee: no filter. We do not buy a newspaper on our way to the train station: there are no newspapers to buy. And besides, we have no money. Well, coins maybe. Bags of coins. Or cowrie shells. But we buy no lottery ticket. And no chewing gum: no wrapper. No ticket for the train – which, anyway, has no timetable. (We’ll assume, just for fun, that there is a train, and a train station, and a house, and an office or workplace to go to – although without plans and schedules and surveys and backs-of-envelopes and blueprints and patents and maps and graphs, all of this is of course highly unlikely; not impossible, but about as likely as you being able to read these words without ever having read or written anything on a piece of paper.