Christine Jacobson

#tinyjoys
#abstraction
Is this, in miniature, the most Henry Jamesian exchange EVER?

"But isn't he tremendously deep in ---." He hesitated.
"Deep in what?"
"Well, in what's going on, beneath the surface. Doesn't he belong to things?"
"I'm sure I don't know what he belongs to"
(Princess Casamassima)

The Novel in the Age of AI: A Roundtable with Elyse Graham, Benjamin Mangrum, and Tom Comitta, Sept 30th at 6 p.m. in Barker Center 133; Margaret Cohen on Claire de Duras: "Who Has the Right to Tragedy?", October 14th at 6 p.m. in Barker Center, Room 133; a Zoom Reading Group on Nick Drnaso's Sabrina, led by Jean-Christophe Cloutier, Nov. 5, at 6 p.m on Zoom

Hey, Bostonians & more far-flung friends, the Novel Theory seminar I co-convene at Harvard has a cool line-up for the fall: a roundtable on the Novel in the Age of AI, Margaret Cohen on Claire de Duras, JC Cloutier on Nick Drnaso.
You are so welcome to join us! (occasionally even on Zoom)

in which @tricialockwood.bsky.social refuses to see the glass flowers at Harvard's natural history museum after too many of us insist that she go (we really are like that I'm afraid) (I sympathize with her completely)

Rent our Vandercook No. 4 flatbed presses! The Tulsa (1948) is open to all; the Nahant (1951) is for production renters. Slower but super precise—great for deep impressions and perfect for beginners. Contact us via Linktree or website to learn more!

#letterpress #bostonprinter #letterpressrental

On Bindings (August 7/8) we were bound to talk about them sometime...

Well, @sibyllacumae.bsky.social and I are back (on schedule), with a longer-ish issue - we're talking about bindings! Read it here: 📜 #bookhistory
open.substack.com/pub/twohalfs...

“My dear Bram Stoker, I am sure that you will not think it an impertinence if I write to tell you how very much I have enjoyed reading Dracula. I think it is the very best story of diablerie which I have read for many years. It is really wonderful how with so much exciting interest over so long a book there is never an anticlimax." Letter from Arthur Conan Doyle to Bram Stoker August 20, 1897 Arthur Conan Doyle Collection Harry Ransom Center The University of Texas at Austin

"It holds you from the very start and grows more and more engrossing until it is quite painfully vivid. The old Professor is most excellent and so are the two girls. I congratulate you with all my heart for having written so fine a book. With all kindest remembrances to Mrs. Bram Stoker & yourself. Yours very truly, A. Conan Doyle.” Letter from Arthur Conan Doyle to Bram Stoker August 20, 1897 Arthur Conan Doyle Collection Harry Ransom Center The University of Texas at Austin

"I think it is the very best story of diablerie which I have read for many years."

In August 1897, Arthur Conan Doyle wrote a letter to Bram Stoker to let him know how much he enjoyed #Dracula. Today you can read the letter here @ransomcenter.bsky.social! (HT @ecolleary.bsky.social)

#booksky 🗃️📜🦇

cannot believe I missed Lockwood when she was in town recently (though according to my husband, she did wave at our daughter)

Patricia Lockwood · Arrayed in Shining Scales: Solving Sylvia Plath I was under no illusion that The Collected Prose would solve the mystery, or lay to rest the lie, of how Plath was...

well this knocked me right down to the ground

www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

ad for the Oliver Typewriter. Copy reads "A DISTINCT TYPE. The OLIVER has certain superior features and unique improvements exclusively its own." Accompanying an image of a piece of type with the nicks on the left, "OLIVER" down the side and in place of a letter face at the top sits an Oliver typewriter.

how incredible is this? typewriter as piece of type! 📜

Ten* (could only get to nine) authors by whom I’ve read more than five* (actually in most cases I've read *just* five) books

Lev Tolstoy
Fyodor Dostoevsky
Henry James
Jane Austen
The Bronte Sisters (cheating!)
Raymond Chandler
Barbara Pym
Zadie Smith
Gary Shteyngart

Screenshot of the top of my article with the title, my name and then two epigraphs. It reads as follows: Queer Transmissions: English Manuscript, Italian Print and a Discomforting History of the Book Sonja Drimmer Confronted with this range of material and contextual complexity, the first scholars of fifteenth- century printmaking were definitely troubled by what they found.1 So let’s think about how it feels to be comfortable.

The printing press is not responsible for launching Europe into modernity, nor did it transform society overnight. Folks like Sam Altman & other tech boosters are obsessed w this misperception bc it provides a precedent for AI. A recent article I wrote touches on this. Abstract & links in replies.

And with 12 hours to spare I've finished my paper and slide deck!

3:30PM! tomorrow! come learn who typed the poetry and prose of Emily Dickinson, Henry James, T.S. Eliot, & Vladimir Nabokov. Plus! Erin McGuirl talking secretary manuals and Dale Stinchcomb on broadway script production! #SHARP2025

BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC NEW SERIES Book History for the Future SERIES EDITORS: Lisa Gitelman, New York University, USA Tom Mole, Durham University, UK Sarah Werner, Independent Researcher, USA Book History for the Future aims to define the cutting edge for a new generation of book historians, as book history enters a new chapter of its evolution. Books sit at a densely trafficked intersection of social relations, status negotiations, emotional investments, material possibilities, desires, aspirations, and dreams. They require an intellectual approach grounded in attention to physical artefacts and material conditions while also engaged in theoretical reflection, attentive to historical contexts while attuned to contemporary resonances. This series publishes books that eschew academic parochialism in favour of adventurous engagements with new theoretical developments, innovative methodologies, digital tools, and global contexts.

Exciting news, Bluesky! I’m editing a new book series for Bloomsbury with Tom Mole and Lisa Gitelman: Book History for the Future! Do you focus on material textual artifacts and innovative methodologies? We’re actively soliciting proposals, so give us a shout! www.bloomsbury.com/media/cecjzl...

holy smokes

Type on a type bed

Type on a Washington Press

Printing a broadside at #sharp2025
This is a reproduction of The North Star, 1848 from Frederick Douglas, originally printed about a mile away in Rochester, NY.

slide deck that reads, "Thanks for Typing Surfacing Women's Type Labor in the Archives" on the left and on the right a lithograph poster of a woman in a golden edwardian dress sits working at a typewriter on a table with books and a vase of flowers

hey #SHARP2025 good news, I have started work on my slides for my presentation that starts in *checks notes* 48 hours

Screenshot of presentation slide featuring advertisements for distributors Fine Print and Desert Moon from issues of Factsheet Five.

Getting my presentation on 1990s zines & small magazine distributors ready for the #SHARP2025 conference next week, super excited to be part of a zine panel.

I'm excited to meet you in person finally (right? I don't *think* we've met in person...)

this is very encouraging! my daughter is 7 months and is generally a happy social baby unless close to nap time or is hungry, so I'm hopeful she'll attend a couple panels. unfortunately, I need to take her solo since husband is ill (otherwise he'd be watching her while I was conferencing!)

seeking advice on bringing babies to conferences! (well, in my case, just the one.) replies or dms welcome.

oh this one wasn't on my radar! *adds to the pile*

learning to like late Henry James is like learning to like jogging— the beginning is a struggle, you have to take lots of breaks, and progress is slow. but when it clicks, you're locked in and soaring!!

Movies that feature women typists/working on typewriters? so far I have:

The Best of Everything
Kitty Foyle
His Girl Friday
Woman of the Year
Desk Set
Christmas in Connecticut
Meet John Doe
More than a Secretary
The Spiral Staircase
Working Girl
9-5

A woman in a pinstripe jacket and skirt and Panama hat holds a large pink balloon under a white canopy

took my daughter to Harvard Square to meet (a historic reenactor playing) Elizabeth Glover, the woman who established the 1st printing press in the colonies.

was a little surprised to see her in Edwardian attire handing out balloons but very little is known about Glover so who am I to judge! 📜

the exhibition I am working on could easily be called "flowers and typewriters" --> just read a detail that Henry James would place a fresh bouquet picked from his lamb house garden next to typist Mary Weld's typewriter each morning

black and white photograph of a woman (white, dark hair with bangs pulled back into a bun in a long dark dress and dark shoes) stands with her hands on her hips behind a desk with a corona typewriter and next to a beautiful hutch holding displaying fine china, a silver samova, and a vase of flowers

found joy and courage from this image of Vivienne Eliot (first and ill-treated wife of TS) I came across in the stacks this week; sharing in case it helps buoy others.

just look at that defiant pose! and the unapologetic femininity she brought to her workspace. this was a dame.

to clarify: I am charmed, but don't try this at home!

requested again a book I ILLed last year and to my surprise a few of my brass page tacks were not only left by me (whoops) but also left in place by the ILL and Yale librarians! Lucky break for me; I was looking for this exact passage 📜

happy Father’s Day to my husband whose very funny historical screwball novel has been excerpted again, this time online over at @keep-planning.net 👇

The Thrilling Evidence of Jane Austen’s Imagination

cheers to my wonderful former colleague Dale Stinchcomb and his co-curator Juliette Wells on the wonderful coverage of their Morgan Library exhibition in the New York Times 📜

www.nytimes.com/2025/06/11/a...