Woods in Winter

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was an US-American author and one of the so-called „Fireside Poets“ located in New England. They were very popular writers in their time with people tending to read them by the fireside, hence the name of the group. The writers were, apart from Longfellow, William Cullen Bryant, John Greenleaf Whittier, James Russel Lowell and Oliver Wendell Holmes …

Manarah: The first three issues

Manarah is an old Arabic word for ‘lighthouse’, a place of light to help those on a voyage find their way. Later the word developed into ‘minaret’ – which is the tower of a mosque. I found out about this a few years ago whilst doing research on this topic. The Swiss populace had just voted not to allow the …

BuchDruckKunst 2019

BuchDruckKunst: the fair presenting bespoke artist’s books and works of print. More than 50 atists showcase their works of art made using traditional, new and experimental printmaking techniques, calligraphy and whatever is related to the book arts. As always along with the fair the museum’s workplaces are open and working. The Fork and Broom Press will be there presenting its …

Where the Red Poppies Dance

When living in England as a one year overseas student in 1984/85 I had met with the tradition of Remembrance Day for the very first time. I was touched by the way how the consequences of war were dealt with and also by the scale of it. It left me impressed and thoughtful. Years later I came across the folksong …

Menschen Würde Rechte

History of Human Rights and their manifold declarations goes back far in time. Documents with ideas of steadfast Human Rights from Mesopotamia are over four millennia old. In the world of ancient Greeks Human Rights were known. However, the then accepted notion as to who was to be seen a Human, thus for whom those so-called Human Rights would apply, …

Kurt Tucholsky

„I cannot recall just how and when we first met. It must have been during the 1980s, when I was a student at university and he had been dead for almost fifty years.“ This is the opening passage of an article I wrote for issue 32 of „Matrix – A Review for Printers and Bibliophiles“. It was published in 2014, …

Escaping the Embers

The deliberate demolition of books, libraries, schools, bookshops, publishing houses, archives to me is unpardonable. The loss of knowledge and cultural heritage thereof cannot easily be made up with. Much will be lost past recovery. People need free access to all sorts of knowledge to become educated. It is education that will give us the competence and strength to face …