Shandy on Air

There is still time for the world — until 24th. april — to listen to the BBC4 Program (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0418phf ) where Melvyn Bragg with his guests Judith Hawly, John Mullan and Judith Newbould takes us on vividly digressive tour through Sterne and Shandy. 

Mucus

Mucus in: Tristram Shandys levned og meninger 1st. danish ed. (Borgen, 1976). Copy at Bibliotekshuset Rhodosvej, Amager.

Dog Ears

in: Tristram Shandys levned og meninger (Borgen, 2004) 2. danish edition. Copy at Vanløse Bibliotek. Stamped "Biblioteket Ørnevej" on the title page. Not only was there two copies present at the open shelfs when we visited the library in Vanløse, furthermore — even — was this copy placed on a shelf with the sign: "Good Reading". 

The Straight Line 3

Another straight line. In: Tristram Shandys levned og meninger, Rosinante & Co., 2011

The Straight Line 2

A second straight line in: The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy Penguin Classics, 1986.

Not urgent here

in: The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman. Oxford World Classics, 2000.

The Plot Lines

in:
The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman. Oxford World's Classics, 2009. Copy at York Central Library.

The Lines of Digressions

in:
The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman. Everyman's Library, 1991 at York Central Library.

Digression #2

in: The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman. Oxford World Classics, 2000.

Your own fancy

Half erased drawing "paint her to your own mind——as like your mistress as you can——as unlike your wife as your conscience will let you—’tis all one to me——please but your own fancy in it." in The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman. Oxford World Classics, 2000. —B brought this copy back from an Antiquarian booksellers outdoor box in Amsterdam.

"Fetch me the Packaging Tape

—and let me fix that". —might the previous owner of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman Volume I-III, T. Cadell. London, 1794 — have said, when the back board of Volume I  — at last — fell of the spine.

Back to the future

"I am, The AUTHOR." ——In the copy: The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy Gentleman Volume I-III T. Cadell. London, 1794, from Aabenhus Antikvariat, we also found, in Book Nine (Vol. III) this signature below the Authors dedication to "A Great Man" (Lord *******) —Either Sterne,—The AUTHOR—has been traveling in time —or someone else— perhaps the bookbinder — has been practising skills in writing authors signatures in books. 

What is obscured...

... in

"The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman

Sterne, Laurence

Published by T Cadell, London (1794)
Item Description: T Cadell, London, 1794. Full-Leather. Book Condition: Very Good. 3 volumes, (iv) 26-347: 299; 234pp, contemporary tree calf (slightly worn), joints cracked or starting, gilt ruled spines with black morocco labels, pp 327 & 328 in vol 1 (O8) have been pasted over with marbled paper (however chapter 36 ends on p326 and chapter 37 starts on p329 so it is not clear what is obscured), some light spotting and browning, 12mo (10.5x17.5cm). Bookseller Inventory # 10008"

we found out in the copy of the very same edition:

"Sterne, Lawrence: The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy Gentleman Volume I-III "T. Cadell. Published in London 1794. (4)+ pp25-347; (2)+299; (1)+234 s. Bound in 3 later (ca. 1860), defective calf spine bindings, spines gilt. Former owner's signatures removed by rubbing. Text blocks tight. Some foxing to contents. Vol 2 wateredged. ¶ Vol I lacking pp 1-24. So the book contains title, dedication leaf and then streight to Chapter 1. We are not shure that something is really missing ... !

allerede solgt · spørg Aabenhus Aarhus Antikvariat, Århus C (DK) · ABH143909 ·"

So, it seems that the printer of the 1794 Cadell edition left it to the bookbinder, to cover the pages with "the best marbled paper" in his stock. But in this, he did not. ———"Pox take the fellow!"*

*) http://sterneetcetera.blogspot.dk/2015/07/small-curses-upon-great-occasions.html

...it is not clear what is obscured

The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman

Sterne, Laurence

Published by T Cadell, London (1794)

Item Description: T Cadell, London, 1794. Full-Leather. Book Condition: Very Good. 3 volumes, (iv) 26-347: 299; 234pp, contemporary tree calf (slightly worn), joints cracked or starting, gilt ruled spines with black morocco labels, pp 327 & 328 in vol 1 (O8) have been pasted over with marbled paper (however chapter 36 ends on p326 and chapter 37 starts on p329 so it is not clear what is obscured), some light spotting and browning, 12mo (10.5x17.5cm). Bookseller Inventory # 10008

Calculation

in:
The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, Leipzig 1849.

The Nose #3

"[...] Nature had been prodigal in her gifts to my father beyond measure, and had sown the seeds of verbal criticism as deep within him, as she had done the seeds of all other knowledge———so that he had got out his penknife, and was trying experiments upon the sentence, to see if he could not scratch some better sense into it.——I’ve got within a single letter, brother Toby, cried my father, of Erasmus his mystic meaning.—You are near enough, brother, replied my uncle, in all conscience.———Pshaw! cried my father, scratching on——I might as well be seven miles off.—I’ve done it—said my father, snapping his fingers—See, my dear brother Toby, how I have mended the sense.——But you have marr’d a word, replied my uncle Toby.——My father put on his spectacles——bit his lip———and tore out the leaf in a passion."

The Nose #2

"[...]——Learned men, brother Toby, don’t write dialogues upon long noses for nothing.———I’ll study the mystick and the allegorick sense——here is some room to turn a man’s self in, brother.

My father read on.———Now I find it needful to inform your reverences and worships, that besides the many nautical uses of long noses enumerated by Erasmus, the dialogist affirmeth that a long nose is not without its domestic conveniencies also; for that in a case of distress—and for want of a pair of bellows, it will do excellently well, ad ixcitandum focum (to stir up the fire)."

The Nose

On Joseph Nollekens Marble bust of Sterne (1766) we see that:

“Nihil me pœnitet hujus nasi,” quoth Pamphagus;——that is—“My nose has been the making of me.”—————“Nec est cur pœniteat,” replies Cocles; that is, “How the duce should such a nose fail?”

The scull

In Coxwold, in the porch at St. Michaels Church, next to the epitaphstone*, we found this framed facsimile clipping from The Times on Thursday June the 5th 1969, on the reburied scull — and nearby found skeletal bones — in Coxwold. One thing further — among many others — for us to ponder upon: Tristrams nose, as well as his fathers — and his great grandfathers, that was shaped like an ace of clubs — was quite diminutive. But what about Sterne? Was he just as flat-nosed?

*)http://sterneetcetera.blogspot.dk/2015/08/sternes-stones.html

The Straight Line

Straight line in: The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy MacDonald Illustrated Classics Series.
"This right line,—the path-way for Christians to walk in! say divines——

——The emblem of moral rectitude! says Cicero——

——The best line! say cabbage planters——is the shortest line, says Archimedes, which can be drawn from one given point to another.——

I wish your ladyships would lay this matter to heart, in your next birth-day suits!

——What a journey!

Pray can you tell me,—that is, without anger, before I write my chapter upon straight lines——by what mistake——who told them so——or how it has come to pass, that your men of wit and genius have all along confounded this line, with the line of gravitation?"