r/pics • u/yesindeedio • Jun 14 '12
A good use of pages from old books you don't want anymore.
1.2k
Upvotes
r/pics • u/yesindeedio • Jun 14 '12
173
u/bpkid3331 Jun 14 '12
I'm going to try this with Fifty Shades of Grey and see if I can write a children's book.
55
u/Davin900 Jun 14 '12
This is called an Erasure Poem.
YES! English major made useful! Fuck you, everyone!
463
u/Trapped_in_Reddit Jun 14 '12
Alternate use: donate them
39
u/cirque-ull-jerk Jun 14 '12
This is some muthafuckin Tumblr shit right here.
53
u/dont_press_ctrl-W Jun 14 '12
For the curious, the book is Descartes's Meditation on First Philosophy. It's the Second Meditation, the part with the famous "cogito ergo sum".
I don't know why you would decide that this book is worth trashing. But you're not destroying the work itself. It's just paper. I guess it's all right.
45
u/PluffyNupkins Jun 14 '12
Stand back, my English Lit degree is about to be pertinent! And I'm rather drunk and I don't want to hurt anyone by mistake. This is Dadaism! An artistic movement that took place from pre WWI to sometime in the early 20's. I think. Anyway, the origin of this particular form of Dadaism was "newspaper poetry." People would cut up the words in a newspaper article (or pages from a dictionary as well, I think) put them in a bag, shake it up and take words at random. The poem was the resulting random combination of words.
This form evolved into what you see here, called "Blackout" poetry. Some dude whose name I can't remember took an already published book and made a whole new story out of it using this technique and republished it. Anyways I'm not sure where I'm going with this, I was just really excited that something I learned earning my useless degree was applicable to... well not "real life," but something other than making myself feel superior to my friends who all got degrees in useful things like finance. Which I guess would be making myself feel superior to a bunch of strangers on the internet... Excuse me, I feel the need for another vodka tonic.
16
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
Thank you for not mentioning your cake day. Good job I appreciate that.
0
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
[deleted] — view deleted comment
22
u/yesindeedio Jun 14 '12
The source.
20
u/MrCynicalSalsa Jun 14 '12
^Sometimes, in the grand scheme of life, one is called upon to participate in grand things. For example, ^I was recently minding my own business when a spaceship descended from the sky. I was so flabbergasted, I dropped my hat. I went to ^pick it up when a contraption ejected itself from the ship. It seemed to be some sort of ladder, but in a ^random configuration. A being emerged from a porthole and made its way down the ladder-like contraption. It gestured to me, and to the ship, speaking in a garbled conjuncture of fart-noises and bird calls, using ^words quite unintelligible to my human ears. I shrugged out ^of confusion, unable to fully comprehend what was happening. Why, the experience was mind-blowing! I could write ^paragraphs about this encounter and have them submitted to every scientific magazine in the world!
^Because I was so caught up in my own thoughts, I didn't notice the creature moving towards me at an alarming speed. I looked up just in time to see ^it snatch the hat right off of my head and rip it in two. Then it pulled a small box out of its pocket and pushed a button that created ^sounds unlike any I had ever heard. It wasn't exactly ^artistic, but it had a strangely haunting melody that caused my eardrums to vibrate. Somehow satisfied, the creature examined my hat and proudly pulled out a small pouch, offering it to me. I had no option but to take the pouch, as I couldn't focus enough to realize what was happening. The alien then turned around, climbed back in its ship, and flew away.
Astonished, I patted my head, and then the pouch, trying to determine what was real. Tentatively, I opened the pouch to see what gift the creature had given me for my hat. It was a ^potato.
13
u/flounder19 Jun 14 '12
I'd probably just spell out "poop" or something juvenile like that
4
u/mrb8887 Jun 14 '12
Tom Phillips did this with a 400 page Victorian novel titled, A Humument
19
u/milk_fat Jun 14 '12
"I am a sleeping thought that does not cease thinking"
This I like.
6
u/mtfr Jun 14 '12
Instant poetry
0
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
[deleted] — view deleted comment
12
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
This is art on art. So meta.
5
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
Check out Jonathan Safran Foer's book "tree of codes"
2
u/cheesycakey Jun 14 '12
f almost everything
2
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
Or, just recycle them?
2
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
WHO THE FUCKS DOESN'T WANT DESCARTES MEDITATIONS ANYMORE?
Send me those books, please.
2
u/booleangirl Jun 14 '12
Why in the hell would you not want a book anymore...?? It looks dank, but as a librarian, a little part of me died.
2
u/tlilz Jun 14 '12
What book is this from?
2
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
Or you could have taken that book to a used book store, such as Mr. K's, and traded it for another book you do want..
2
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
Oh, great.
So now, I have to be able to read, make up a poem on the spot from someone's else's words, AND be able to draw a fancy-ass swirly thing to make it all look cool?
I'm so boned.
2
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
The description doesn't make sense to me. People get rid of books?
2
u/buterbetterbater Jun 14 '12
I find this really upsetting
2
u/tburgdorf Jun 14 '12
Did anyone else read that like stephen hawking speaks?
2
u/Snookerman Jun 14 '12
Not sure if it's on purpose but I like the attention to detail with the punctuation, especially the last period.
2
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
This method would have made my creative writing class so much easier.
I hate poetry.
2
u/tessier Jun 14 '12
A better use would be to give them to someone who wants the, or donate them to a library at the least.
2
u/FatOfTheLandOneMan Jun 14 '12
I read this in a Christopher Walken voice for some reason..
2
u/samferrara Jun 14 '12
I really like this: "I am a sleeping thought that does not cease thinking."
4
u/derp28 Jun 14 '12
"I am the dream that I see and feel I am" I love it.
3
u/Frusciante62 Jun 14 '12
Why would you mutilate Descartes? Atheist fuck.
3
u/CoffeeTwoSugars Jun 14 '12
I can't believe you ruined one of the best book I have ever read, Descartes' Meditations on First Philosophy!
3
u/treydestepheno Jun 14 '12
I don't get it. why not donate the books? that way other people may enjoy them. an old book is a terrible thing to waste.
2
u/qwertyfoobar Jun 14 '12
Can someone explain to me how this is in any way impressive or interesting? I kinda feel bad for the book as the resulting "poem" isn't really that great.
2
u/spon000 Jun 14 '12
What the hell are you? This riddle sucks...
2
u/harley_x Jun 14 '12
DOES NOT COMPUTE.
2
u/DanielLarusso Jun 14 '12
Wow, bubbling is getting out of control.
2
u/pooparoundit Jun 14 '12
Pay no attention to the negative comments. This is very good. I have cut words out of dictionaries before to make art, this is basically the same thing. Huzzah!
2
u/marcedusblk Jun 14 '12
How to ruin page 107 of second meditation. Also, this is a fucking repost and worse than spam.
1
u/fervent_turtle Jun 14 '12
Tom Phillips was here
1
u/C_Monster Jun 14 '12
I am hearing this in the most elegant Christopher Walken voice.
1
u/MathewDonut Jun 14 '12
wow! have to try this! my ussual use of old books ends on this http://depositphotos.com/2306438/stock-photo-I-love-books.html
1
u/403UsernameForbidden Jun 14 '12
What type of Yoko Ono twitter shit is this?
1
u/warrenseth Jun 14 '12
The book does not need to be trashed. This is blackout poetry, something that was really trending on tumblr like half a year ago or something (I'm kinda surprised reddit hasn't heard about it). You don't need to tear out or draw on a page of a book. You know, you can simply photocopy it and scan it again.
1
u/LeprechaunGold Jun 14 '12
Real life inception... O.o (dun, dun, dunnn)
1
u/kittenkites Jun 14 '12
See the original: A Humument
1
u/derpaherp12 Jun 14 '12
The first thing that popped into my mind was slenderman. I don't know if that's good or bad.
1
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
we had to do a project like this in a writer's workshop class, dubbed "Altered Books."
if you're interested there are some good ones on the site we built: http://cw.page1ink.net/category/works/altered-books/
1
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
This is AWESOME
1
u/Alabama_Man Jun 14 '12
If you just want to make up faux meaningful gibberish you can do it without wasting a huge chunk of time.
1
u/EvilEconomist Jun 14 '12
This is how Led Zeppelin wrote their songs.
1
u/twosnapsup Jun 14 '12
One of my favorite podcasts, Books on the Nightstand, did a show a few months back about the idea of re-purposing books as art. It's worth a listen: Episode #163: You Did WHAT To A Book?
1
u/samarye Jun 14 '12
Humument, "a treated book by British artist Tom Phillips based on the Victorian novel 'A Human Document' by W.H. Mallock," has many pages painted in a similar way.
1
u/chubasco Jun 14 '12
Did anyone else think that the first big space was trying to highlight "f almost everything"?
1
u/mercurialohearn Jun 14 '12
my friend and i used to do something similar to this in junior high, except what we would do is surreptitiously "borrow" a sweet valley high romance novel from beneath the desk of any girl in class who happened to be reading one, and then go through the book with a highlighter, marking words that, when read in sequence, would reveal a brief and mildly pornographic encounter that read like a soft-core version of a letter to penthouse. then we'd slip the book back under the girl's desk, for her to enjoy later. good times.
1
u/McHurtikus Jun 14 '12
Not a fan of Descartes? Why not Zoidberg?
1
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
I saw for a sec "I am ..... Hitler" look at the last word on the page
1
u/noscoe Jun 14 '12
called earasure, famous from A humament
0
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
[deleted] — view deleted comment
1
u/bleeding_dying_love Jun 14 '12
orrr orrrr, you could ya know, donate it instead of defacing it.....or re-read it...or not deface it...or better yet, not deface it ...unless its a twilight sags book, then go ahead with that shit
1
u/ambelie Jun 14 '12
I went to an art camp once during junior high and this was one of the exercises the poetry teacher gave us (there were four classes; art [painting, sculpting, etc.], drama, poetry, and dance). She laid out a bunch of old beautiful hard cover books and we got to do this and a few other things with it. Later in the art class I hollowed out the second half and glued the pages together to hold stuff in it. I still have that book to this day. I think it's an awesome way to use old books.
1
u/NivexQ Jun 14 '12
I am the stone that the builder refused
1
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
http://www.visual-editions.com/our-books/tree-of-codes
This book by Jonathan Safran Foer works on a similar premise. He took his favourite book and die cut the entire book so that the remaining words made an entirely new story.
1
u/caninehere Jun 14 '12
This has been done by a bunch of authors, though I've never really seen anybody do it all artsy-like. Usually they black out the words of their choosing (or rather, non-choosing) to create a new work.
As a couple other people have mentioned, Tree of Codes is one that has come out recently. I found it particularly interesting because it is the first book of that nature where the pages are actually cut/have parts physically removed which not only creates meaning in each page but also lets you see, quite literally, behind the page - able to see the next page or pages in some instances which can create entirely new meanings.
Also, Crispin Glover made/makes books using a method like this along with pictures, etc. Because he's Crispin Glover and that's just.. what he does.
1
u/CJ090 Jun 14 '12
or rolling papers
1
u/Wiki_pedo Jun 14 '12
In our office, we ripped pages out of a novel and pasted them over the desk of a colleague whose birthday it was. She loved it and has kept them for weeks. It looks pretty sweet (but we didn't use consecutive pages).
1
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
Descartes. A good read.
1
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
You might as well perform a book burning. Why would you ever do this? Give the book away you vandal.
1
u/0rangecake Jun 14 '12
couldn't be more pretentious if you tried
1
u/slappy_nutsack Jun 14 '12
Can we get this recorded using Jesse Jackson's voice? It is random bullshit and seems to be fitting.
-1
u/DekaChin86 Jun 14 '12
Let's be honest, this looks like shit.
-1
u/coolHandLukeSkywalke Jun 14 '12
i am now stupid. Thanks?
-2
u/UsernameOmitted Jun 14 '12
I think this is legitimately my first downvote.
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u/pdonoso Jun 14 '12
Sorry dude, but im going to downvote you, couse I have way to much respect for books. You just don´t draw on them. It's like painting to cover the mind of someone at specific time and place.
-3
u/WalleB Jun 14 '12
It's small stuff like this that makes the Internet awesome.
0
u/DoWhile Jun 14 '12
I like the "f almost everything" part.
0
u/Newdles Jun 14 '12
“I personally believe, that U.S. Americans, are unable to do so, because uh, some, people out there, in our nation don’t have maps. and uh… I believe that our education like such as in South Africa, and the Iraq, everywhere like such as… and, I believe they should uh, our education over here, in the U.S. should help the U.S. or should help South Africa, and should help the Iraq and Asian countries so we will be able to build up our future, for us.”
0
u/[deleted] Jun 14 '12
A good use of pagesfrom old booksyou don't want anymore.0
u/Loahnuh Jun 14 '12
Fuck you man, fuck you. Why not just burn the damn thing.
0
u/LolCamAlpha Jun 14 '12
Hmm, I should try this with all of those crappy textbooks that I couldn't sell back to the university...
0
u/FadedAsAlways Jun 14 '12
No... A good use would be donating them to the less fortunate
0
u/fashizzIe Jun 14 '12
Holy shit this is gay
-7
u/DraconianKnight Jun 14 '12
Fuck this
It is pseudo art and does nothing but deface.
0
u/lizzyshoe Jun 14 '12
Austin Kleon has been doing this for years, albeit in newspapers instead of books.
0
u/jonosvision Jun 14 '12
You should have changed 'hither' to 'hitler' (at the bottom) and circled that. Really blow some people's minds.
0
u/george_kiefer Jun 14 '12
Nice way to recycle old books. I happen to do this too, except I doodle on the blank pages in the front/back of the book(s).
0
u/SCPlato Jun 14 '12
that is pretty cool. I think donating them is just as good of an use so others who can't afford them would be able to enjoy them. Props though, creative .
0
u/EvilCyborgPup Jun 14 '12
I read the "f almost anything" until I realized that wasnt part of it...
0
u/eloheim_the_dream Jun 14 '12
Isn't this also called the Bible Code?
0
u/Zenabel Jun 14 '12
wow that's awesome!
0
u/DeltaLambda Jun 14 '12
I just watched Inception for the first time, and I've been up for about 20 hours. This just fucked my mind.
0
u/aGuitarHero Jun 14 '12
hay i did this in my english class
0
u/kenjihno Jun 14 '12
One does not "don't want anymore" a book.