Some scholiasm of bibliodisia...

I have just come into possession of a remarkable letter. It is a type written letter from Christopher Morely with great autograph marginalia in Morely’s hand. It is, to all extent and circumstances, an unknown letter…all the more remarkable as it speaks at length of William Osler and Doyle’s Holmes. It includes Morely’s recollections and reflections Osler and his passing (who he “was lucky enough to know a little as a boy at Oxford”).

There are paragraphs that bring a tear to the eye and others that make one laugh out loud. It is truly outstanding. I can not decide if I should annotate and publish it or sell it to someone who desires to do the same. For now, I just want to reread it over an over again.

I offer you one of the more surreal sentences, classic Morely, “I still seriously count on something even larger than a book-jacket from yr sensitive & sinewy hand; some scholiasm of bibliodisia, some Calamities & Quarrels of Collectors, some Noctes Atomianae, some basketful of keen-colored fungus as Pearsall Smith suggested.”

It is an “important letter,” but more than that…or rather, part of that importance…is that it is so personal, so heartfelt and so introspective. OK, I admit it, I have not been so intrigued and excited by a single item in a very long time. I really love what I do.