A man and his “vandalized” book covers

Looking about me and taking in the full extent of the collection, I felt a giddying thrill at the very idea: the consummate delinquency, the shameless delight taken in such an articulate and extended act of vandalism. In daring contrast to everything I had been taught about looking after books, Roy’s library represented a lifetime’s commitment to sheer mischief and I thought that wonderful.

from Remembering Roy Gold, Who was Not Excessively Interested in Books – The Public Domain Review

The Future Library

From the website:

“Scottish artist Katie Paterson has created a one hundred year artwork Future Library “Framtidsbiblioteket” for the city of Oslo in Norway.

“One thousand trees have been planted in Nordmarka, a forest just outside Oslo, which will supply paper for a special anthology of books to be printed in one hundred years time. Between now and then, one writer every year will contribute a text, with the writings held in trust, unpublished, until the year 2114. Tending the forest and ensuring its preservation for the one hundred year duration of the artwork finds a conceptual counterpoint in the invitation extended to each writer: to conceive and produce a work in the hopes of finding a receptive reader in an unknown future.”

https://www.futurelibrary.no

He would take me with him when I was a boy
before that was something people did,
the two of us riding the subway,
then walking a few blocks in those canyon-like streets
to the insurance company where he worked.

There, he would set me free to wander
up and down the long rows of typists,
clacking away on their manual machines,
fingernails red and hands blue
from the carbon paper, famous
for working the miracle of the triplicate.

Source: Billy Collins on Workplace Poetry – Xerox