I know I had a panda bookmark a little while ago, but this is one that my friends just brought me back from China and I wanted to post it right away. It has a ruler on one side because you never know when you might want to underline something. Not that I would ever do that. The little pendant is bamboo so that the panda will have something to eat. Or at least that’s what I was told.
Book: Confucius and the World He Created by Michael Schuman
This is not a pipe. It’s a pipa (琵琶) or Chinese lute. But actually it’s not a pipa either. It’s a bookmark in the shape of a pipa. Some friends just returned from a visit to China and they brought me back a bunch of bookmarks. More coming soon!
Book: Restless Empire: China and the World Since 1750 by Odd Arne Westad
I second this panda’s opinion. I’ve known some hoarders and what they usually hoard is a lot of junk. They’re not like book people at all.
Book: Selfie: How We Became So Self-Obsessed and What It’s Doing to Us by Will Storr
I’ve had a few cat bookmarks on display here but I think this may be my first doggy. From the shape of it I’d guess a Scottish terrier, which is one of the few small breeds I have an affection for. They have lots of personality.
Book: The Puritan Family: Religion and Domestic Relations in Seventeenth-Century New England by Edmund S. Morgan
Ah, the National Book Festival. I remember it well . . .
Just kidding. Actually I don’t remember the NBF at all. But I’m not sure anyone else does either. I picked up these bookmarks celebrating the 1983 and 1985 festivals (forty years ago!), but I don’t recall attending any NBF events. Nor could I find anything about them on the Internet.
My guess is that they didn’t last that long, and were eventually superseded by the Word on the Street festivals that started in Toronto in the 1990s and are still going. Because how many book festivals can you have? Even the more successful ones that I know of don’t draw all that much attention.
Book: Northrop Frye’s Writings on Education edited by Jean O’Grady and Goldwin French
I have to admit I don’t have any memories of Britnell’s, though I was living in Toronto in the late 1980s and early ’90s and I’m sure I must have stuck my head in the door a few times. The store itself had quite a history, first being opened in 1893 by Albert Britnell at a slightly different Yonge St. location. It had a run of over a century, closing doors in 1999 for what I assume were the usual reasons. It was taken over by a Starbucks, though the name Albert Britnell remained carved into the façade of the building, right above the Starbucks sign. The Starbucks (one of Toronto’s first) closed in 2020 and I’m not sure what’s there now. I think Britnell’s name is gone too. All we have now are the bookmarks, and I’ll bet there aren’t many of them left.
Book: Adrift: America in 100 Charts by Scott Galloway
I’m not sure where or when I picked this one up, and I have to say it’s not a favourite. It has a kid’s craft flavour to it, with the pink plastic straps being woven through the blue frame to spell out letters. In this case PEACE. My main problem with it is the texture, as it feels both rough and slick at the same time, and not in a good way. Still, I don’t have any other bookmarks like it and I do appreciate variety.
Book: War by Gwynne Dyer
So last weekend was the Book Bash, a sort of fair where local authors and publishers have tables set up where they sell their books. This year it was held at the Farmer’s Market, which was a good venue. Anyway, at one of the tables there was a jewelry designer named Margaret-Anne Cripps (her website is Black Star Vintage) and she had a selection of bookmarks made out of little items connected by a ribbon. Each one unique! I got one with an elephant attached to a coin from the island of Tonga.
Book: Flaubert: A Life by Geoffrey Wall
Halloween coming up so here’s a spooky themed bookmark for you. I think Pet Sematary is one of King’s best books so I didn’t mind splurging a few bucks for this one.
Book: Zombies! Zombies! Zombies! ed. by Otto Penzler
Actually, I don’t think the ancient Egyptians used bookmarks because they didn’t have books. They kept written works on scrolls.
This is kept in a plastic sheath because it’s painted on papyrus, and it’s very thin and delicate. I can’t remember where I got it, but it wasn’t Egypt. So most likely some museum.
Book: A World Beneath the Sands: The Golden Age of Egyptology by Toby Wilkinson
Alex Good 