JF Ptak Science Books Post 1110
Following this week's posts Occupational Alphabet and Touch of Evil action Alphabet is this constructed alphabet of Dada-like images, non-sequiturs taken out of context and which--once placed on a their own stage and on their own easel in the strong Borges tradition of the reader making the book--strongly remind me of the Marcel Duchamp readymades. The source is Kantner's Illustrated Book of Objects and Self-Educator in German and English, a self-teaching book for German vocabulary, published in Pennsylvania in 1879. The woodcut images used to illustrate each word are fantastic, and occasionally stunning, sometimes unexpected illustrations of forgotten objects and actions. I've selected the images that have selected themselves, mostly-solitary images infested with that uncommon, simple quality that illuminates them as Dadaist.
The alphabet is sadly not complete--j, x,y and z were lacking images.
Kantner has a strike against him in a Scrabble match. Nothing for j, x, y, & z?
The picture for "bomb" is enigmatic. What kind of bomb do you think it depicts?
Posted by: Jeff Donlan | 20 August 2010 at 11:25 AM
The "j" is problematic here; didn't find any, a holdover from the 18th c. Very odd. Probably Scrabble wasn't high on Kantner's mind, though god only knows why--the fact that it wasn't yet invented is no excuse. And the bomb is enigmatic, esp if wasn't identified--I do recognize it as a type whose name I can't recall, the "v" shape actually being a place for a fuse. They use them in Pirates of the Caribbean I, Ar.
Posted by: John F. Ptak | 20 August 2010 at 12:25 PM
Arrr! I'm glad you're getting in the mood. Talk Like a Pirate Day is just a month away.
Posted by: Jeff Donlan | 20 August 2010 at 07:04 PM
Slap me thrice and call me Mother! When arr isn't it arrr a good arrr time arr to arrr talk arrr like arrr a Pirate? Arrr? A?r?r?
That bomb was actually more like a hand grenade.
Posted by: John F. Ptak | 20 August 2010 at 09:31 PM