The vintage connoisseur is not limited to the collection of old things. The true connoisseur will also collect the stories of old people. When I said I wasn’t sure about taking the time to go to a Friends of the Library book sale last weekend, my eighty-year-old neighbor, Mrs. Boaz, a dependable font of discriminating…
Devoting oneself to the study of artifacts by default means thinking in terms of obsolescence. For the contents of the curiosity shop are often those forlorn orphans unable to cross over into modern aesthetics or make themselves useful to 21st-century life. Let’s face it. Kindles have a lot on printed books. And Kindles are good—great—for…
If those who have studied the art of writing are in accord on any one point, it is this: the surest way to arouse and hold the reader’s attention is by being specific, definite, and concrete. The greatest writers–Homer, Dante, Shakespeare–are effective largely because they deal in particulars and report the details that matter. Their…
Oliver Douglas: Mr. Haney, that pile of junk isn’t worth $8. Haney: To the unappraiseable eye, yes. I had each and every one of these objects de art evaluated by an in-unpeachable source: the county tax assessor, or as we sometimes call him, Cousin Joe. Before Mike Wolfe and Frank Fritz of American Pickers, there…
The Old Curiosity Blog 