Scribble Yoga, Scribble Dollhouse, Scribble Birds
Welcome to the twelfth Love Thy Library post! It’s been a month since the last one :-( And that makes me sad. But! Here we are!
I missed the last post because I was travelling—thought I could post a day late, but soon realised I had set unrealistic expectations of myself (something I am working on in 2025 and beyond!).
This post is being sent from my home city of Melbourne, Australia. I haven’t been back in over a year since moving to New York, and something I’ve enjoyed so far is working from my local library in East Melbourne. Ideally, I would’ve liked to publish this from there, but I’m starting to get sick and home felt more appropriate.
The selections this week are from the Internet Archive and have something in common (I’m sure you can guess!). All of these books have been scribbled on in some capacity. If you’ve been following LTL for some time now you probably know I enjoy books that have imprints of interaction with past owners or borrowers—making them a record of lived experience. I also love the mystery of it and thinking about who, why and when, followed by fictitious stories of their lives. So silly, but fun!
This might be my longest intro yet!! That’s what a month away does :’). As always enjoy and chime in with any thoughts, questions or comments. I love it all!
Title: Practical Yoga
Author: Masahiro Oki
Year: 1973
Publisher: Japan Publications Trading Co
Loaned from: Internet Archive
The elements of this book that excite me include the scribble on the front and back cover seen together—almost mirrored, the tear from the title page, the title font, the brown scribble on black and white photographs, instructional photographs—especially of yoga poses and the various styles of imagery used.
Title: Hobbies for Everyone: Dollhouse Miniatures
Author: Harriette Sheffer Ables
Year: 1980
Publisher: Chicago: Childrens Press
Loaned from: Internet Archive
The elements of this book that excite me include the front cover—such an epic design (!), everything miniature, the photograph in the margin on page 10, the colours of the photograph on page 11, the Fairy Castle dollhouse and its incredibly detailed and opulent rooms and the scribble (likely from a librarian) on the back inside cover.
Title: Now I Know Birds
Author: Susan Kuchalla, Gary Britt
Year: 1982
Publisher: Troll Associates
Loaned from: Internet Archive
The elements of this book that excite me include the scribble throughout this book, the tear in the blue end-paper, the hand-drawn page numbers, that the publisher is called ‘Troll Associates’, the various scribble colours (proof the artiste was having real fun!) and the variety of bird eggs.
If you choose to share the content from this newsletter, by all means! But please give credit where credit is due :-).
See you in a fortnight!
Love Lucy from Ok Books
Lucy, I think your substack is the only substack I read that gives me real joy (well yours and Edith Zimmerman's). I appreciate the way you consider things, and turn the sometimes mundane into something quite beautiful. This post makes me want to hunt for scribbles :) The libarians scribble could be popped in a frame and hung on a wall. So cool how some of the yoga scribbles mimic the poses, and I love how the "artiste" has given those birds a perfect blue sky to fly away in ;)
Looking forward to your next discoveries.
Those dollhouses 😍