Anthropodermic bibliopegy: the grotesque history of books bound in human skin

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Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/08/21/literary-fates.html

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“Put the lotion in the basket!!!”

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“The Necronomicon” has always been my go-to reading for when I want something bound in human flesh. Now if I could only remember those magic words. . . .

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I have the feeling human skin doesn’t make very good leather seeing how delicate it is.

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It’s all in how you cure it.

Or so I’ve heard.

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Apparently pus and skin are inextricably connected. Hmmm…

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A major function of skin is keeping itself covered in oily sebum

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I did not need to know this.

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Hey, I heard your uncle was a book binder - what a neat job to have.

… oh… sorry… I misunderstood.

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Punctuation alert!

> … the murderer who asked to have his biography bound in his skin and presented to the lawman who caught him after his execution.

The lawman caught him after his execution?

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We have eternity to read your flesh?

I’ve always been deeply fascinated by this and have considered having this done with my own body after death. Because, if you gotta go, go as weird and blasphemous as possible

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Much easier that way. I think it was Chief Wiggums.

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And why did they execute the lawman?

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How would you have punctuated that differently?

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How? Would you have, punctuated that, differently?

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“the murderer who asked to have his biography bound in his skin after his execution, and presented to the lawman who had caught him”

At least that’s what I’d do. That is to say, that’s how I’d have rephrased it, not what I’d like to have happen to my skin, just to avoid further confusion.

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Referee! The comment I replied to said “Punctuation alert”, nothing about rearranging the sentence.

(But yes, yours removes the potential ambiguity.)

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giphy%20(1)

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Hey, that’s my friend!

In addition to the Under the Knife series, she has a book, The Butchering Art, about Joseph Lister and the fight to introduce germ theory to medicine. In addition to describing a real paradigm shift in the practice of medicine, it’s full of gory details about pre-anaesthetic, pre-sterilization surgery.

https://books.google.com/books/about/The_Butchering_Art.html?id=UMWxDgAAQBAJ&source=kp_book_description

(Do we still talk about paradigm shifts? Am I showing my age? )