Book Art: Chocolate

Last century, I drew and rubberstamped a story called A Sad Story about Chocolate. It was a fictitious, political history of chocolate, and it truly was sad. I turned it into a small book that is perfect bound with silver cardstock covers, a black spine piece, and a printed linoleum cut in brown ink in place of the rubber stamp I had carved. The spine has a silver rubberstamped title.



Recently, I've been revisiting some of my old stories, wondering how they hold up, and remaking them. As I read A Sad Story with both new and older eyes, I was struck by both the humor and the angst, and also how eerily close it was to the current adjunct professor situation I'm in. I remade A Sad Story about Chocolate as A Fight for Chocolate, keeping nearly all of the original amusing text, but with a new, hopeful ending.


It is laserprinted on bristol, and each folded page is in sequence across the fold. The chocolate bar shows up in black, an image of the original rubber stamp. It has a new title page, several new pages at the back, and a new colophon.


It is perfect bound: glued at the folded spine.


But it is also glued at the open fore edges, like an album accordion.


And it has a letterpress printed, painted paper cover that is glued front and back, like a softcover drum leaf binding or a children's board book. The extra fold at the back allows the spine to move so the book can open flat. That section is exactly the same depth as the spine. You don't put glue on either the spine or the section next to it. This binding of chocolate, even with its soft cover, is sturdier than its cousin.



I still have about four copies of the original. Both chocolates, A Sad Story about Chocolate and A Fight for Chocolate are now available at nevermindtheart


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