New Life for Old Tomes: Pipe and Tobacco Book Reprints: Difference between revisions

New Life for Old Tomes: Pipe and Tobacco Book Reprints (view source)

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 PODs are often missing pages, contain inverted or blurry print, and have other shortcomings that suggest poor quality control, but as the old saying goes: you get what you pay for. Most of these problems are the result of scanning—the book must be taken apart—resulting in low-res images and, often, misaligned pages. The reprints coming out of South Asia, particularly India, are of very low quality, with an unfitting spine and new formatting. But, as an enticement, many reprints have been gussied up with “premium leather edition” bindings and gold-embossed lettering.
-Books printed before 1925 are public domain and can be reprinted, but that should not be the reason to reprint the ones I have identified herein in the 21st century. Why the titles on this list were chosen, and why so many different reprinters is, to me, a mystery. It is not a judicious, reasoned selection of material. There’s no rhyme or reason, considering that there’s been no hue and cry from pipe smokers for more tobacco and books, and smoking and tobacco have been under attack for a number of years. I don’t buy the concept that republishing public-domain books offers an opportunity to recycle or repurpose existing—even classic—works. Way too many trees have been felled and too much ink has been expended to produce several different reprints of mostly obscure and rarified titles that have been released during the last few years. I am reminded of a question in a book of fiction by Robert Pobi, ''Do No Harm'': “Did the world really need a million copies of On the Origin of the Species, or was one digital copy, available to everyone, the smart route?”
+Books printed before 1925 are public domain and can be reprinted, but that should not be the reason to reprint the ones I have identified herein in the 21st century. Why the titles on this list were chosen, and why so many different reprinters is, to me, a mystery. It is not a judicious, reasoned selection of material. There’s no rhyme or reason, considering that there’s been no hue and cry from pipe smokers for more tobacco and pipe books, and smoking and tobacco have been under attack for a number of years. I don’t buy the concept that republishing public-domain books offers an opportunity to recycle or repurpose existing—even classic—works. Way too many trees have been felled and too much ink has been expended to produce several different reprints of mostly obscure and rarified titles that have been released during the last few years. I am reminded of a question in a book of fiction by Robert Pobi, ''Do No Harm'': “Did the world really need a million copies of On the Origin of the Species, or was one digital copy, available to everyone, the smart route?”
 I do believe, however, that there are many important, well-written, out-of-print books that should be reprinted, but there’s no way to convince those who produce reprints to honor my request. What surprises me is that the most popular book of all time—with the exception of ''My Lady Nicotine''—is Carl Ehwa Jr., ''The Book of Pipes & Tobacco'' (1974), has not been reprinted in almost 50 years! Carl Ehwa died in 1996, and the publisher, Ridge Press, is no longer in business. Mary McNiel should know who has the copyright. That’s a book that a resourceful reprinter should consider.
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 My illustrated article, “World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893: Columbus Pipe Redux,” appeared in CIGAR Magazine, Fall 2008. The book, of course, is more significant, because it is a very detailed history of a heretofore-unknown meerschaum pipe—more specifically, a second Columbus-themed pipe—to the collector world. ''Die Berühmte Columbus-Pfeife'' is the most influential, fact-filled, illustrated book in any language on this very narrow topic and timeframe.  I would think that every antique pipe collector would want a copy, even if it is not translated into English, because the several images in it are worth thousands of words.
-Now to the promised list of reprint books about pipes, tobacco, smoking, poetry, and accessories. These were, until recently, out of print, but now have a new life. Call ‘em “old stacks … new leaves”! I’ll assume (perhaps, wrongly) that the prospective reader of this narrative is not into first editions, revised editions, premier editions, or limited (i.e., numbered) editions, and prefers to spend his money on pipes—the “shiny” object—rather than on literature. This is a low-cost way to obtain these specialized books, if you want the content and care not a whit about the cover. You’ll save money and, depending on the seller, you might sacrifice reading quality.
+Now to the promised list of reprint books about pipes, tobacco, smoking, poetry, and accessories. These were, until recently, out of print, but now have a new life. Call ‘em “old stacks … new leaves”! I’ll assume (perhaps, wrongly) that the prospective reader of this narrative is not into first editions, revised editions, premier editions, or limited (i.e., numbered) editions, and prefers to spend his money on pipes—the “shiny” object—rather than on literature. This is a low-cost way to obtain these specialized books, if you want the content and care not a whit about the cover. You’ll save money but, depending on the seller, you might sacrifice reading quality.
-Every time I searched the Web, I found yet more reprint titles, some of which did not include the reprinter and/or the reissue date, so I excluded those, but I had not anticipated that the list would continue to grow like Topsy. After many time-consuming hours searching online, I concluded that this endeavor would be a never-ending Herculean undertaking. Eventually, I gave up. The list, therefore, is somewhat incomplete, because it does not include ''every pipe and tobacco book'' that has probably been reprinted nor ''all the reprints'' of every book on this list. It is organized, alphabetically, by author, date of first printing and later reprints. I’ve made every effort to exclude anti-tobacco tracts and treatises, agricultural studies, books on smoking cessation, etc. I make no distinction between later versions (e.g., revised editions, softcover editions, etc.) from known publishers and POD providers. As to the exactness of the information, all I’ll say is that it’s the sum and substance of what I found on the not-always-accurate Web. Did I access another source to corroborate this information? Unfortunately, these reprints are not in the WorldCat database.
+Every time I searched the Web, I found yet more reprint titles, some of which did not include the reprinter and/or the reissue date, so I excluded those, but I had not anticipated that the list would continue to grow like Topsy. After many time-consuming hours searching online, I concluded that this endeavor would be a never-ending Herculean undertaking. Eventually, I gave up. The list, therefore, is somewhat incomplete, because it does not include ''every pipe and tobacco book'' that has probably been reprinted nor ''all the reprints'' of every book on this list. It is organized, alphabetically, by author, date of first printing and later reprints. I’ve made every effort to exclude anti-tobacco tracts and treatises, agricultural studies, books on smoking cessation, etc. I make no distinction between later versions (e.g., revised editions, softcover editions, etc.) from known publishers and POD providers. As to the exactness of the information, all I’ll say is that it’s the sum and substance of what I found on the not-always-accurate Web. Did I access WorldCat to corroborate this information? Unfortunately, these reprints are not in its database.
 It’s a very long list … it’s a good start, it requires more time and more research to complete … but I hope I have done a yeoman’s service for pipe-smokers and pipe collectors everywhere.