Here’s what I’m thinking about, with an Exacto-knife in my hand. I’m slicing off a layer of dried leather and glue, trying to cut as thin as possible so I won’t damage the paper underneath. And here’s what’s going through my mind…
A little over two hundred years ago, another fellow was carefully applying glue to the same part of the book, that same glue that I’m trying to remove. I’m thinking about him, working in his bookbindery, applying the skills that he acquired as an apprentice, working in whatever light was slipping through the window – or maybe, working late by candlelight – to artfully connect two leather-covered boards to protect the fragile paper pages of a just-published book.
How old are you? If you’re in your early thirties – or older – and could be transported back into its time, the Declaration of Independence would have been written in your lifetime. This book was first put together in 1807, in America’s first generation of freedom from English rule.
Thinking on it, I’m pretty sure that – while I’m thinking about him and his work – it never crosses his mind that another person will come along behind him to repair damages to his product, his book.
It certainly wasn’t his fault.
In fact, as the book was presented to me, I could appreciate the beautiful leather covering the outer boards. Unfortunately, the hinges – that part of the book that takes all the punishment every time the volume is opened up to read – did not fair so well. One was being held on by a piece of linen tape after being completely loosened from the book. The other was still hanging on like a loose tooth in the mouth of a seven-year-old.
The job ahead of me? Take as little apart as necessary from a book that has survived more than two centuries, and put it back together in an artful style that will do credit to the original binder and preserve the book – hopefully – for another two hundred-plus years.
Man.
I shouldn’t think about it like that. Don’t need the pressure.
It’s enough that the book’s owner has entrusted it to me to return it to him in a condition that is not only better than it was when dropped off, but nice enough that he can show off the book as part of his collection.
And me? Just a practical bookbinder.
These are the adventures.
In January of 1807, the year this book was first put together, every street and alleyway in every neighborhood of the world was dark after sunset – except Pall Mall in London, where gas lighting had just been installed. Ludwig von Beethoven had his 4th Symphony performed for the first time. Slave trade was abolished in the US and England, at least by vote. Robert Fulton got his steamboat out on the water and proved its worth. It was in that same year that this little book was under the hands of a bookbinder with greater skills than I possess, who was finishing off a product destined for the hands of someone wealthy enough to own a book.
Things have changed since then.
Not just the ability to own a book, either. Those years of apprenticeship in learning the bookbinding skills are less necessary. What I know was learned from Youtube videos and some practice.
There is some respect in there, too.
I love books. That ought to be obvious. A book in the trashcan is either a cardinal sin or an act of decency, like euthanizing a crippled thoroughbred. Working to repair or restore a book is just part of my passion. But I’m not an Old World bookbinder.
We’ll see how it turns out, but for now, scraping the old glue and leather from the spine of this one has me thinking. I have a lot of respect for the person who put this together. I don’t want to screw it up.
I have no time to think about how long my repair will hold up, and whether someone will come along in another one-or-two-hundred years to scrape away the evidence of this evening’s book-surgery, after what I hope will be a successful outcome. There aren’t any guarantees, anyway. The current owner might drop it in a puddle of water after walking out of the store. I’m giving my best effort, damn the Kindles. It’s a nice little book and deserves whatever life-extension I can give it…
Come visit! There are plenty of old (and not so old!) books to look over!
McHuston
Booksellers & Irish Bistro
122 South Main Street
Broken Arrow, OK 74012
