Is There Beauty Yet to Find? - PART 1

Yes! And again, yes! ... in the pages of books!

I love a loved book.

Not a book that I loved so much on its own merits as a book that someone has loved, and in which linger shadows of that affection. This is part of the reason why I am possibly at my happiest in a used book store, rummaging through stacks of stale, brittle books to find what someone left behind that I will regard as "keepers."

What's a keeper? It's simply a book that somehow catches my eye, tickles my fancy or tugs at my heartstrings, usually because in it I connect in some small way through it to another life.

Mind you, this is no ordinary literary love; I sometimes choose a book because of who owned it, not what it is. Sometimes I choose it for reasons that boil down to what its existence in print says about the world as it is and the world as it was. Sometimes the books even choose me, like those in the bag brought to me furtively in the darkness of a Havana night in exchange for a few American dollars. Most curiously, perhaps, these books are sometimes best left unread.

I'm made ever richer by sharing this love with a similarly bibliophilic husband. Part of our honeymoon and much of our honeymoon money was spent poring over the books in a tiny used book store in a fire-ravaged part of Southern California. New books are wonderful, but old books are priceless.

Today I want to share a few of this special type of best-loved book from our collection, which tell me with certainty that there is Beauty yet to find.

SHORTER POEMS OF JOHN MILTON 1961 - Durham, NC

This book was selected not just for the printed content -- although Milton is worth the second look -- but also for the thorough notes taken by Ingrid on nearly every page. It was clear that this was a matter of study, but there is also a hint of love in the carefully-penciled notes that tell us that a line in Il Penseroso "evokes melancholy" or ask what "we will dream of on perfect day."

THE COLLECTED POEMS OF RUPERT BROOKE 1925 - Montecito, CA
This book inspired the title of this entry and the idea behind it. The pages of this tome are lovingly interspersed with clippings and notes and underlined passages. However, this isn't the sort of note-taking that goes with a college course. These are far more personal. I get the feeling, leafing through these pages, that "Molly" of Niagara Falls, Ontario, whose hand wrote these words

Is there Beauty yet to find? and Certainty? and Quiet, kind? (Page 159)

on the end-papers, had a deep love for the author: a passionate, tragic figure who died in the Aegean in 1915 at the age of 27.
We don't know anything about Molly, really... except that her books were no longer of use to her by the time Daniel stopped in to browse the estate sale. That, and that she was something of a romantic -- her heart moved by the poems of a certain British soldier-poet. Still, I feel that I know her deeply when I turn the yellowed pages of her book and encounter her thoughts lovingly preserved there.
EN MARCHA CON FIDEL 1982 - La Habana, Cuba
NORSK PROSA 1968 - Durham, NC
& KROPPSVÅRD 1932 - Julian, CA
En Marcha Con Fidel (On the campaign with Fidel) came not from a bookstore, but from a Cuban man I had asked to simply find me books. Bookstores in 1990's Havana were little more than repositories of Leftist propaganda, and while this book was no different in that regard, it was different in that it came from someone's private collection. It was brought with about 8 other books -- most of which had been printed in Argentina, and all of them were of rather poor manufacture and further degraded by elements and time. The man was eager to be rid of the books and to be on his way. I didn't understand his position, at least not entirely, but I believe it is safe to say that purchase marked my participation in the Cuban Black Market. Of all of these books, only this one and perhaps two others remain intact enough to really read.

(This page shows the dedication of a book by Che Guevara to the author of the present book)

Castro stepped down today. Of course, what that really means is probably not much... but we shall see. For me, Cuba is not Castro, and Castro is not Cuba. Cuba is a beautiful country with an immense heart, trapped in time and poverty. This book, though focused on Castro, is emblematic of my time there and holds special memories for me. Cuba, though real, lives differently in my imagination than it does in reality

Norsk Prosa was selected because in it is a selection from Kristin Lavransdatter in the original Norwegian, but the fact that it bears the full name, address and phone numbof a student named Glenn who was studying it in 1977 doesn't hurt. My ties to Norway are fragile after all this time, but Norway provides one of the largest tributaries into my bloodline. This book is about place imagined -- a place I want to go but have never seen. A place to which I owe some portion of my existence, but to which I cannot meaningfully connect... yet.
Kroppsvård (pictured above)... well, I don't quite know how to translate (perhaps it is the author, I don't know!), but the subtitle, I can. This is a sort of practical handbook for the "modern" housewife, including exercises, childrearing advice and information about personal beauty and hygiene. I cannot begin to tell you how this book delights me, not in the least because of the photos inside. It is, for me, another connection to Daniel's and my Scandinavian heritage -- in this case, it's the half-Swede in Daniel the book channels. I cannot help wondering about the woman who purchased this book in order to model her life after it. She wrote a short note on the page here... that the picture shows the "boat rowing" activity. I also wonder how the book, printed in Stockholm, came to rest in a sleepy town in the mountains of California where our paths could cross.


SUB-EDITING 1946 - London, England
This book came to me via a shelf of the Hotel Elizabeth off Hyde Park in London. We were staying there for several days, and so we took the time to look at the library remainder books that lined the shelves by the stairs. This title, replete with examples of reproductions of all kinds of newspapers dating back to the 1700s, quickly caught my fancy and followed me back to my room. The editor in me couldn't resist.

Here, a few years later, the book is again in my hand. Mind you, I didn't lift it. I talked to the staff and offered to purchase it. If memory serves, they gave it to me at no charge. In any event, this former holding of the Paddington Public Libraries is now on permanent loan to me.


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Post dedicated to the memory of
THE BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER ca. 1930 - Montecito, CA
This special book was pocket-sized and leather-bound, dating from the 1930's and came from the same estate sale in Montecito that introduced Rupert Brooke into our lives. This book was a well-loved Canadian edition with flowers and clover pressed between its pages. Daniel used to go up to Penn Park in Whittier on his lunch breaks during Lent and read the Psalms from it. He kept it in a box when circumstances changed, and, when he opened the box about 7 years ago, his heart broke to find only the cover and a bunch of paper shreds.