The Usborne Book of the Future
March 20th, 2008
ROBOTS / FUTURE CITIES / STAR TRAVEL (star travel?).
Archive for the 'fulltext' Category
Manual of the diseases of the eye
March 12th, 2008
Ok, a) eye diseases, with color plates, cool. But maybe more importantly, b) this is the first Google book I've found where there are scans of fingers holding the pages down. And frequently. Very charming.
The Clichés are Having a Ball
March 6th, 2008
"Thus Casablanca is not just one film. It is many films, an anthology. Made haphazardly, it probably made itself, if not actually against the will of its authors and actors, then at least beyond their control."
Rare Type Specimens at the Open Library
March 3rd, 2008
Some really nice type, in a really irritating interface. Some of these are apparently downloadable as pdfs.
Rare Books on Calligraphy and Penmanship
February 25th, 2008
Jaw dropping.
Meditations
January 18th, 2008
"That which has died falls not out of the universe. If it stays here, it also changes here, and is dissolved into its proper parts, which are elements of the universe and of thyself. And these too change, and they murmur not. "
Cyborgs and Space
January 14th, 2008
A not particularly carefully OCR'd pdf of Clynes' and Kline's groundbreaking article on the plausibility of modifying the human body to adapt to extended periods of spaceflight. Might be worth considering in the face of the doping scandal, might not.
Trips to the moon
October 20th, 2007
Mentioned in the liner notes of the Criterion "For All Mankind," which does this year's "In the Shadow of the Moon" one better by being soundtracked/scored by Brian Eno. This is the earliest known account of a (speculative) trip to the moon
The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction
September 5th, 2007
"Even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be."
ambient music
August 24th, 2007
"Ambient Music must be able to accomodate many levels of listening attention without enforcing one in particular; it must be as ignorable as it is interesting."
The Future of Music: Credo
August 24th, 2007
Manifestos like Cage's seem to tend to act against the expectations of more everyday futurism, which tends to predict a future like the present, only moreso, by somehow managing the feat of envisioning a future that is truly different from the present.
Aspen Magazine
August 24th, 2007
via leahb. I remember reading some of these essays in school and actually also learning about Aspen at more or less the same time, but I've never delved into it in the way that ubuweb's archive makes possible and to some degree demands. via leahb.
New York City in Sound
July 12th, 2007
Impressionistic treatment of late 60's manhattan in sound by Antonioni, introduced by Walter Murch, and reprinted in full on bldgblog. Somewhat late to the party on this one, perhaps, but I need to mark it down so I'll remember to read it someday.
The Societies and Governments of the Moon
July 9th, 2007
Called out by Calvino in his essay on "Lightness." Notable for discussing various methods of space travel, including rocketry and vials of dew.
Antipode
June 5th, 2007
I haven't had the chance to delve too far into their archives, but this seems really interesting.
Leah's totally right. The Gefion Fountain should rightly be the piece of decorative Copenhagen that gets decapitated every other week, instead of that pissant little mermaid thingy. Section 5 of the Ynglinga saga has more on Gefion.
Full Revelations of a Professional Rat-Catcher
May 12th, 2007
"Ike Matthews is also willing to go out rabbit-shooting with gentlemen during the season, and will supply and work ferrets at reasonable charges. He is also prepared to break dogs and puppies to ferreting and Ratting on reasonable terms." via bb.
Freud: The Uncanny
May 6th, 2007
"It is only rarely that a psycho-analyst feels impelled to investigate the subject of aesthetics, even when aesthetics is understood to mean not merely the theory of beauty but the theory of the qualities of feeling." thx, kio!