Canto X - The Glassy Plain

Recently I attended an examination of a private collection of books with a view to making purchases for the shop. The seller had an impressive array of titles – mainly history and large art books – some of which attract very healthy prices in the secondhand market. Along with these were a very nice range of classic literature titles, hardcovers dating from the 30s and 40s which are excellent for padding out the classics department. As it turned out, despite the presence of over 50 boxes of these offerings, we walked away with very little.

Why? Almost every single book was covered in adhesive plastic.

There are some who think that adhesive plastic – most often marketed under the brand name ConTact® – is a boon to collectors, and to libraries, where books are worked hard for their contents, this may be the case. However here’s a definition for you:

*****

damage /’dæmıdzh (noun): 1. Injury or harm which impairs value or usefulness; 2. (in bibliophily) anything which removes a book from its original state.

*****

People who sell books for their value as objects – not simply for their contents – regard adhesively plasticized volumes as irreparably damaged, and of little worth. Simply put, as far as book collectors go, ConTact® is the work of the Devil. If, for example, you ordered a book online from a secondhand or antiquarian bookdealer and it showed up covered in the demon plastic, you would be well within your rights to demand your money back – unless their description of the book explicitly stated the presence of the hellish material. Some dealers don’t care about ConTact®; some care so little that they forget to mention it, considering the stuff a useful addition to the book’s structure and integrity. These are not dealers with whom you should do business.

When dealing with rare books, the term “Fine” (or the hideous misnomer, “Mint”) declares that the book is new and unused – in the exact state which you would expect if you bought it off the shelf in a new bookstore. In secondhand and rare bookdealing, if a book isn’t “Fine”, the reasons why it isn’t must be explicitly stated; otherwise, someone’s trying to sell you a pup. Anything done to a book to “protect” it, or repair it, is classed as “damage” in the trade and it should be noted in the book’s description.

Non-adhesive plastic is available and widely used, even by those who eschew ConTact® in all its Satanic forms. It is a worthy addition to a book’s integrity and will extend its life, or the life of its dustwrapper; however, it too, must be noted in the description.

Remember: adhesive plastic is for school books and library books (which is why the term “Ex-Library” is considered so poisonous in the book trade). Don’t stick it on your precious collectibles! Let them breathe!