- Paperback: 336 pages
- Publisher: Bantam Books (Transworld Publishers a division of the Random House Group); New edition edition (1 Mar 2004)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0553814427
- ISBN-13: 978-0553814422
- Product Dimensions: 19.4 x 12.8 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 830,815 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Product Description
By the 1960s a copy of Graham Greene's Brighton Rock without its dust jacket was worth about #500. But with its dust jacket more like #2,000 - if you could find one. The last copy with a perfect jacket to come on the market changed hands at #50,000. Brighton Rock was a high-point, but first editions of other early Greene books weren't much less valuable. And then there were signed copies, foreign printings, limited editions, numbered and signed...John Baxter caught the collecting bug in the winter of 1978 when he found a rare copy of Greene's children's book The Little Horse Bus while browsing in a second-hand market in Swiss Cottage. It was going for 5p. It would also, fortuitously, be the day that he first encountered one of the legends of the bookselling world: Martin Stone. At various times cokehead, pothead, alchoholic, international fugitive from justice and professional rock musician (said to knock Eric Clapton into a cocked hat), he would become John's mentor and friend, and a central figure in this book. In this brilliantly readable, stylish and funny book John Baxter introduces us to his world, the world of the fanatical book collector: not only the kind who buys from catalogues or at auction and takes away the booty in bubble wrap to store in metal filing cabinets - but also the sleuth, the one who uses bluff and guile to hunt down his quarry. Along the way we meet a cast of eccentric characters like Driff Field who only collects books about suicide or by writers who have killed themselves; we meet the completists, the condition freaks, the rich and famous - from Barry Humphries and Harvey Weinstein to Sarah Michelle Gellar. This is a book with real word-of-mouth potential that literary editors will go weak at the knees for; booksellers will bask in and the literati will adore.
About the Author
John Baxter is a novelist and broadcaster, as well as being a highly acclaimed film critic and film biographer. His subjects have included Fellini, Spielberg and Kubrick. He is currently completing a biography of Robert De Niro for HarperCollins.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Disappointing,
By A Customer
This review is from: A Pound of Paper: Confessions of a Book Addict (Paperback)
This was something of an anticlimax. Baxter's accounts of tracking down books and authors are good, sometimes very good, but his writing too often degenerates into shapeless lists of minor authors, book titles and film titles: "...Iris Owens ('Harriett Daimler') and Austryn Wainhouse ('Pieralessandro Casavini') both had later careers under their own names, as did Terry Southern, co-author of Candy, and Chester Himes, the African-American writer of Pinktoes. Canadian poet John Glassco already had a minor reputation when he agreed to complete Aubrey Beardsley's Under the Hill for Olympia..." And so on. I suppose this is inevitable in a book by a film critic and book collector, but it becomes tedious after a while.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Breezy Anecdotes of a Life in and Around Books,
By
This review is from: A Pound of Paper: Confessions of a Book Addict (Paperback)
I've been on a kick lately where I'm reading lots of "books about books," and/or "books about reading," which led me to pick this one up. The subtitle "Confessions of a Book Addict" is an apt one, as this is essentially a rambling memoir whose only unifying theme is the author's love of books. And while it does delve into the rarefied (and often grubby) realm of book collecting and collectors, that's not really the focus. Actually, other than the author's lifelong love of books and telling a good story, there is no real focus -- which really isn't a problem, since Baxter is able to maintain the breezy entertaining cadence of born raconteurs. And although like many raconteurs, his stories sometimes veer in unexpected directions and digressions, they are rarely unwelcome ones.Baxter (a sometime fiction writer and noted film biographer) begins at the beginning, outlining his drab and dreary Australian childhood. Like so many bored kids, he found an outlet in books, films, and eventually pulp magazines. As a teen and young man, he grew up something of a science-fiction fanboy, joining the inner circle of Australia's minuscule sci-fi community, while working a dreary job for the national railroads. After some initial forays into writing (including bios for a porn mag), he heads to London, where his love affair with books turns him from a consumer into a collector. The reader tags along with Baxter as he hobnobs with the weird-but-true characters of the used book trade in London, before he heads off to Roanoke, Virginia to teach, then Los Angeles, and eventually Paris, accumulating and then shedding books along the way. One has to accept that a lot of the authors and personalities he encounters and discusses aren't exactly household names -- especially for American readers. But the point is not name-dropping (well, maybe that's a little bit of the point), but to recall the bon mots and funny moments he's has around the literati and the scrubby "runners" who formed the backbone of the pre-internet used book trade. And as Baxter ages, the anecdotes shift from bidding on books off the back of a cart in a filthy London back lane, to the high tech book trade now conducted on Albiris and eBay. Collectors of any ilk will thrill along with Baxter as he recounts finding treasure troves of rarities in places overlooked by others -- hope springs eternal! And even if you're not a collector, it's hard not to smile at his colorful descriptions of such disparate scenes as outback movie theaters, '70s orgies (not something I expected in a book about books!), the peculiar nature of Paris bookshops, and the proper decor of one's office in a small Southern college. To be sure, this is a book by a book lover and for other book lovers. That said, it's not 100% about books by any stretch, and the meandering prose has its dead spots. But on the whole, it's a pretty entertaining memoir, full of unexpected scenes and insights.
0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
not as enjoyable as I expected,
By
This review is from: A Pound of Paper: Confessions of a Book Addict (Paperback)
Some amusing anecdotes for book lovers but also too much rather tedious background around it, so I gave up around half way through.
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