Volume 2 of “Travels” with its new spine.

Last year I was fortunate enough to receive a copy of the second volume of Travels from an Illinois-based book collector, Jeff Armstrong. The book was in pretty good shape, but the front board and free endpaper were detached from the spine and the headband and tailband were crumbling. After much deliberation, and very much in heart-over-head mood (this is an expensive business, after all), I decided to get the book repaired. The work was carried out by Otter Bookbinding, who did a splendid job (not adequately attested to in the photograph above). As far as I can tell, this is the first repair work to be carried out in this book’s 234-year history. If the book continues to hold up similarly well, the next repair shouldn’t come due before 2250.

Proofs of “Circulating seditious knowledge”.

On the day I took delivery of the repaired book, I also received proofs of the long-in-press chapter on Macintosh, part of an edited collection, Mobilities of knowledge, due out in Springer’s Knowledge and space series next month. After a half-decade gestation, it will be good to see this chapter finally out, not least because the whole book will be open access. Mobilities is due to be published on 24 October.

Both the repaired book and the chapter proofs are a welcome boost following news this summer that my application to the Leverhulme Trust for research funding had been unsuccessful.