Illinois Press Book Blog

Writing for Critical Mass, the blog of the National Book Critics Circle Board of Directors, Rigoberto González includes Oni Buchanan’s Spring in his roundup of recent poetry books published with an accompanying CD.

“Simply slip the CD-ROM into the computer and click away. We are able to see the three ‘Mandrake vehicles’ change before our eyes. A few of the words even have an extra kick, like the word cartoon whose o’s become exaggerated eyes momentarily before it settles at the bottom of the page. It’s a nifty feature without becoming a gimmick.”

Sometimes day-to-day drudgery buries the idealism that likely lead to one’s choice to “work with books” (my only stated goal 10+ years ago) and for a university press. A passing, untitled mention in the New York Times, of a literary biography published 28 years ago can create Monday morning cheer.

Inside Higher Ed reports this morning that the National Communication Association is comdemning the University of Illinois policy of restricting employees’ political speech.

And further down the page, in mathlete news, a 13-million-digit prime number was identified.

The University of Michigan library has installed an Espresso Book Machine, also known as the “ATM of books.” For around $10, patrons can use it to print any out-of-copyright book in their collection. I’m not sure whether to proceed with coffee or banking (or Google) metaphors here, but the library-publishing world may have just gotten a little flatter.

If I say it was a night to remember, will you forgive me the cliche?

Last evening more than 120 guests gathered at the President’s House in Urbana to celebrate ninety years of publishing by the University of Illinois Press. As President Joe White said in his comments, it was just about as perfect an autumn evening in central Illinois as one could hope for.

Here are some shots from our Press photogs:

Roberta and Maggie await the first arrivals.

Guests gather on the patio.

Cool jazz in the drawing room.

Vice President Meena Rao, Press Director Bill Regier, President Joe White.

Associate Director Joan Catapano, Dr. Rao, and guests.

A buffet to remember.

Chancellor Herman and guests.

Listen up.

Living in the Land of Lincoln, one can’t help but notice Abe’s image splashed on everything from Illinois license plates to state and municipal buildings. And, of course, there’s the penny, which has featured Lincoln since 1909, and hasn’t changed in fifty years.

On the eve of the 2009 Lincoln Bicentennial, the U. S. Mint recently unveiled four new penny designs. Slated to be released in three-month intervals next year, the coins depict Lincoln’s birth and early childhood in Kentucky (1809-1816), his formative years in Indiana (1816-1830), his professional life in Illinois (1830-1861), and his time as President (1861-1865).

For more on Lincoln’s personal and professional life in Illinois, and the ways in which he shaped his own image nearly 200 years ago, see UIP’s Lincoln the Lawyer and The Shadows Rise: Abraham Lincoln and the Ann Rutledge Legend. New paperback editions will soon be released to jumpstart the bicentennial celebration.

I’m really excited about one of our newest journals here at UIP. It’s the American Journal of Play. No, not “play” as in Shakespeare. There are already plenty of journals examining that subject. But rather “play” as in tag, Monopoly, wooden blocks, and Mario Kart. As a parent to two young girls, I’m interested to see what the Journal will have to offer not only to psychologists, historians, and educators, but also to ordinary parents interested in understanding how they can facilitate the growth of their children through play.

Check out the tables of contents for issues 1 and 2 here.

*****

Jeff is the Associate Journals Manager at the University of Illinois Press

Inside Higher Ed reports today that University of Illinois employees may ”not wear political buttons on campus or feature bumper stickers on cars parked in campus lots unless the messages on those buttons and stickers were strictly nonpartisan.”

I’m wondering if we need to remove from our bulletin boards the Women For President buttons that we created for our recent Erika Falk book.

Mitch Ratcliffe on the ZDNet blog highlights some of the initial problems many see with nascent ebooks. He ties the lack of a standard accepted digital format (with ePub on the horizon, but not yet applied) and current limitations caused by mentally clinging to the idea of a “copy,” to what I see as the worst limitation of current ebooks and even ejournals—their isolation. Digital books, especially non-fiction, should be more than static copies of their paper counterparts. Yes, hyperlinks can interrupt and even stop a reader, because they require more-than-mental action, and he rightly sees that formatting as pitstops on the way to a better entity. I know I’m stepping on hallowed ground as a lover of paper books, but imagine a properly placed, embedded music file in a book like Poetry and Violence, or even hyperlinks placed in The Lincoln-Douglas Debates bringing one to appropriate points in the editor’s video discussions of the debates, appearing, if one wished, in the margins . . . that is what I hope to eventually experience from a book.

Thanks to LISNews for pointing to Mitch’s post.

Very Short List recommends a vital new time-waster.

“Eight years ago on SNL, [Christopher] Walken played a producer tasked with pushing ‘more cowbell’ onto Blue Oyster Cult’s already-anthemic ‘(Don’t Fear) The Reaper’. . . . Walken’s skit … inspire[d] More Cowbell — an absurdly wonderful Web app that turns any MP3 into a miniature disco inferno.”