Fine print: tiny tomes

March 18, 2006 10:44 AM

2-inch books (flash) is a delightful exhibit of tiny hand-crafted books. The 2005 winners (pdf) of the Miniature Book Society's annual competition offers a sampling of little books that have been published. Tiny tomes have been delighting readers and collectors for 4,000 years. If these tiny treasures intrigue you, perhaps you'd like to collect your own vintage or contemporary library.
posted by madamjujujive (11 comments total)

some wonderful things there--thanks juju! : >

there are a ton of binding instructions online if people want to try their own
posted by amberglow at 10:53 AM on March 18, 2006

Very cool link.
Amberglow, thanks I was just about to ask how to make them!
posted by uni verse at 11:05 AM on March 18, 2006

there are a million different techniques, uni--the accordian style is the easiest tho.
posted by amberglow at 11:18 AM on March 18, 2006

I can't figure out why, but there's something oddly disturbing about a 'Thumb Bible'.
posted by blacklite at 11:53 AM on March 18, 2006

A New Testament (180,568 words) printed in 24 karat gold on silicon is the world's smallest book:

The book is actually a tablet that's five millimeters (0.196 inches) square. It is pictured in the Guinness record book perched on a pencil eraser. Each letter in the text is the size of a red blood cell or a small bacterium. "One can get an appreciation of the size of the text from the fact that 10 lines can comfortably fit within the thickness of a single strand of human hair," Sinha said.

MIT has several other small books in their collection.
posted by cenoxo at 12:42 PM on March 18, 2006

posted by rob511 at 4:38 PM on March 18, 2006

this is awesome...thanks...
posted by es_de_bah at 9:09 PM on March 18, 2006

amberglow, that's a fantastic link, thanks - great resource, lots of interesting links to surf from that site. Like this artist who creates some odd works by encasing books in beeswax or this neat source for handbound journals and blank books.
posted by madamjujujive at 9:45 PM on March 18, 2006

Cool stuff, cenoxo - those micro-mini books are rather amazing. That reminds me of a prior thread about silicon art. Here is a story about the previous record holder for the smallest book, and here's a picture of a book as small as a match head by the renowned German publisher Die-Gestalten Verlag.

While Googling, I also came on a rather fascinating article about a collection of tiny books recently recovered after being lost post-Katrina that talks about the perils of owning such small books due to how easy they are to misplace.
posted by madamjujujive at 10:14 PM on March 18, 2006

Excellent stuff madamjujujive et al.
posted by peacay at 10:22 PM on March 18, 2006

...the perils of owning such small books due to how easy they are to misplace.

MIT's Media Lab also has the answer to that little problem — the world's largest published book:

"Bhutan: A Visual Odyssey Across the Last Himalayan Kingdom" weighs in at more than 130 pounds and stands at five by seven feet, nearly as big as a Ping-Pong table. The book features more than 100 pages of spectacular images of a country often referred to as "the last Shangri-la," and showcases a variety of new digital, photographic and printing techniques.

Make it your dining room table book from Amazon for a paltry $15,000 (not eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping, sorry.)
posted by cenoxo at 11:32 AM on March 19, 2006