Books Acquired Recently

di Prima, Diane. Haiku. Illustrated by George Herms. 1967. South Pasadena, CA: X Artists’ Books, 2019.

I love di Prima’s work and I love haiku, so of course I would eventually buy this book! It was originally printed in an edition of 100 unbound copies in 1967, so I’m glad it’s currently available in a more accessible format.

—. Revolutionary Letters. 50th Anniversary Edition. San Francisco: City Lights, 2021.

I recently read di Prima’s The Poetry Deal, which includes several “Revolutionary Letters,” and I enjoyed them enough that I decided to buy the full collection.

Tiessen, Hildi Froese. On Mennonite/s Writing: Selected Essays. Edited by Robert Zacharias. Winnipeg: Canadian Mennonite University Press, 2023.

Hildi Froese Tiessen is perhaps the most prominent figure in the history of Mennonite literary criticism, so I am very glad that this volume of selected essays now exists.

Ward, James. Adventures in Stationery: A Journey Through Your Pencil Case. 2014. London: Profile Books, 2015.

I’ve always enjoyed stationery, and I have become obsessed with fountain pens over the past year, so I have been looking for books to read about the subject. There are surprisingly few considering the overlap between the analog cultures of book people and pen people. I recently heard about Ward’s book, and it sounded interesting, so I decided to buy a copy.