Posts by Pablo Alvarez

We may sound playful by making a skeleton pop out from a book, but for centuries images like this one, as found in the printed page, were a serious warning of the imminence of death. For instance, these frightening illustrations were common in the published works of the seventeenth-century Jesuit preacher Jeremias Drexel.

It seems odd that the first recorded images of tiny creatures as seen through the lenses of a microscope were engravings of a bee included in a bilingual edition (Latin and Italian) and commentary of the poetry of the first-century Roman satirist Aulus Persius. But here is the fascinating story explaining it all.

We are very pleased to announce that the online exhibit, Puzzle Me This: Early binding fragments from the U of M Papyrology Collection, is now available to the public.

Since we are now “celebrating” Banned Books Week, I thought that readers of our blog would be delighted to know that the Special Collections Library holds an important selection of early-printed editions of the justly infamous Index librorum prohibitorum (List of Forbidden Books).

We have recently purchased an engraved broadside (259 x 339 mm.) depicting what at first sight looks like a regular scene of family life in the seventeenth century. However, a closer examination reveals a very different picture: a dysfunctional household or, to be more precise, a satire of domestic happiness...