Figure 1. Hieronymous Bosch, Ship of Fools (1490-1500), Louvre Museum, Parisby EILEEN JOY
Within the next 2-3 weeks, the BABEL Working Group will be making a more official announcement regarding the launching of a new book series, Punctum Books, to include our vision statement, Editorial Board, and initial forthcoming titles. In the meantime, here is a sneak preview:
Announcing Punctum Books
Cheers.
6 comments:
This is very exciting. Tuned, I will stay!
Incroyable! Is there no end to your marvellousness? Expect to be flooded with proposals...
WV is nice today: sprach.
Very exciting, and looking forward to the official announcement which will describe the (no doubt) atypical mode of book delivery etc. Will you be following a model like that of re.press?
If you have a moment, could you (or Nicola) talk about the relation between your quotations from Augustine and Barthes? The two punctūs strike me as very different, but I'm guessing that's the point.
Thanks to everyone for the enthusiasm. Our model will be something like a combination of re.press and Open Humanities Press, with a dash of McSweeney's:
http://www2.mcsweeneys.net/books
As to the two different quotations, from Augustine and Barthes, re: punctum, I will let Nicola also respond to that [the quotations + name were his inspirations], but briefly I can say here that we wanted, as always, a leap from the medieval to the modern [and back again], but also, for me, to invoke the following senses/feelings/atmospheres/intentions for the book series:
punctum *also* meant to silently denote the marks made in medieval mss. to make lines for writing [and punctum books, therefore, as the site of enabling writing]
Augustine:
everything is happening *now*
writing-as-time/time-as-writing
interrelation between "this time" and "whole time" [with the site/act of writing as the "puncture" of time]
Barthes:
affect/being *pierced* by thought & writing
the extimacy of writing/words
disruption of the study [the unexpected]
scholarship-as-art-as-desire
being surprised
And I should have also added, following Barthes' inspiration:
writing as aperture/opening
writing as risk/taking chances
the possibilistic
This is good news, and I look forward to learning more.
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