I wrote a short text on a Canadian issue dating dec. 31 1971 - the “eve” of the bibliophilatelic very famous “International Year of the Book” 1972 - in the ib.weblog and at least I want to include the image of the FDC here as well:

One may easily guess: The definitive stamp pictures Elizabeth II and the Canadian Library of Parliament. The FDC adds a view into the reading room.

I wrote a short text on the following two mexican stamps in the ib.weblog (this time german-only, sorry for that):

Biblioteca José Vasconcelos
issued: may 16th 2006

Mexico Turistico / Central Public Library
issued: september 11th 1987

While being in Croatia I came across another piece of bibliophilately which was issued last year and honors the 400th anniversary of the National and University Library in Zagreb.

I blogged a short text about it right here.

Right. I haven’t posted anything for quite a long time but promise to increase the frequency a little during the next weeks. This time a just want to state that my bibliophilatelic passion and the blog are still alive and therefore as a sign of life I post a link leadingt to a weblog called The Daily Brunei Resources - helping to foster a better informed Brunei society which introduces Brunei’s most expensive stamps.
Of course there is not much bibliophilatelic in the shown - and in this case overprinted - scene on the Brunei river issued in 1906 resp. refering to the shown example with the red Japanese overprint from the 1940s. But it is interesting to see someone getting back to stamp issues following the aim of fostering a better informed society.
I very think of the real value in stamps regarding being some document of a society’s resp. nation’s history outnumbers the sometimes pursued possibly cash-value of any stamp or stamp collection several times. And to see it that way makes collecting and enjoying this little cultural invention, at least for myself, even more exciting and - at the same time - much more relaxing. (By the way: As far as I see there are no bibliophilatelic issues getting close to some namable cash-value, fortunately…)

While doing some online search this article crossed my way and shall be kept here for the record: Stamps as an information source in the National Library of Turkey by Hakan Anameriç. (published in: Library Collections, Acquisitions, and Technical Services Volume 30, Issues 1-2, March-June 2006, Pages 117-127)

Abstract:

Stamps, like any other non-book material such as banknotes, coins, posters, and maps, serve as recording media and source for information that illustrates the social, commercial, political, cultural, historical, and artistic aspects of a society in their own unique style. Using short and abstract text, color graphics and symbols on a limited surface area to communicate its contents is the key attribute that differentiates stamp from other non-book material. For this unique attribute, the stamp can be deemed both as a communication tool and a work of art. Conversely, stamp and other philatelic material in Turkey are largely regarded as collection materials rather than being a source for information. This study aims at performing a qualitative and quantitative analysis of the stamp collection at the National Library of Turkey as well as providing information on cataloging and maintaining of stamps and offering them to the attention of the public to stress the importance of stamps as a source for
information rather than just a collection material.

I haven’t been posting here for quite a while for several reasons but at least for today I’m really delighted to add some update. This features a rather new stamp issued this years february 12th by the french La Poste. It is a somehow “classical” bibliophiatelic piece devoted to the Bibliothèque humaniste de Sélestat, which is a nice personal coincidence because it was in Sélestat where I bought my first french stamps at a local post office right after visiting the Bibliothèque during an Alsac-Library study trip some of years go. (I just googled it up: It was October 10th 2003…) This year the impressive library which resides since 1889 in some building at the corner Rue de Sel and Rue de la Bibliothèque (while the post office can be found three minutes away in the Rue de la Poste..) celebrates its 555 anniversary and despite I’m not sure whether there is some relation to the topical’s issue, I just go ahead and suppose there is one. One nice trivia is the inscription of the storefront’s mosaic mounted in 1907 saying “Stadtbibliothek - Museum” in german as Sélestat belonged between 1871 and 1918 to Germany as a garrison town.

The stamp features an illuminated initial of the Livre des Miracles de Sainte-Foy written by Bernard episcopal schoolmaster of Angers. The nominal value is 60 cents. The engraving is done by Jacky Larrivière.

Many thanks to Larry T. Nix who sent me this beautiful postage stamp - among others which I hopefully will have time to comment here soon.

There is a new book-related postage stamp to be issued by the Finnish Post on March 3rd 2007. It is minisheet with two stamps honouring Finlands the reformer and father of written Finnish, Mikael Agricola, who died 450 years ago.

The first stamp shows the first book printed ever in Finland: Agricola’s Abckiria (Ye ABC booke) published 1543. The second displays a figure drawn by Lucas Cranach which pictures Mikael Agricola preaching. It is taken from an issue of Agricola’s translation of the New Testament. The circulation of the minisheet will be 300 000. The stamps are designed by the finnish designer Timo Berry, who became i.e. famous for his “Freedom of Expression”/Amnesty International-poster. The minisheet is printed by Joh. Enschedé Stamps on Sopal Satimat paper.

I know, I nurtured this blog a little sloppily the past months. This is because (of course) there is plenty of things to do and I rarely find some minutes to spend with my philatelic collection. But yesterday I received a small gift from one of our lecturers at the Institute of Library and Information Science in Berlin and so I carry on to share it here digitally:

- click on the image to enlarge -

The shown FDC is something I would call a bibliophilatelic classic. It was issued 1990 still as an GDR issue in a four stamp set showing “Treasures of Libraries in the GDR”. I’m a little hurry right now so I’ll add some additional information later.

Today I want to add a very special bibliophilatelic issue coming from the GDR, which might be one of to most overlooked in bibliophilatelic history, to my virtual collection.

The stamp was issued november 28th 1972 being part of a set of six (Michel No. 1807-1812) dedicated to famous fictional characters of the east german childrens television. Some of them are quite famous till now - at least “Herr Fuchs und Frau Elster” (Mr. Fox and Mrs. Magpie) - others are almost forgotten (like “Schnuffel und Pieps“). One character that was completely unknow to me, is the one shown: “Paulchen aus der Kinderbibliothek” (Paulchen of the childrens library, Michel-No. 1812 ). Nevertheless it is very nice one. The very copy I have is one I just found in some album from my own childhood days which may be an explanation for its “used look”…  

So here is another library related stamp - this time from Russia. The definitive features Дом Пашкова of the Russian State Library (Российская государственная библиотека) in Moscow, which is said to be the most beautiful building in the whole city. The postage stamp is one of fifteen from the 1992 to 1995 issued series “Monuments”. The shown one was issued 1995 an is numbered as 6122 by Scott resp. 418 by Michel Catalogue. 

The Russian State Library was founded in 1862 as Russias first public library. It is located near the Kremlin in the very center of Moscow. The pictured building “Dom Pashkov” however is older. Is was build from 1784 to 1787 by order of Pjotr Pashkov by the architect Vassily Bazhenov. It was heavily damaged by the big fire of 1812 and rather “decently” reconstructed until it was bought by the state in 1839. After that it was reconstructed more ”costly” and became in 1862 the first public museum of Moscow (Rumiantsev Museum).  From 1925 it was the home of the Lenin Library, which was renamed in 1992 to its current name. Since 2003 it is - again - in reconstruction which will last approx. till 2008 (more on this can be found here (in Russian)).  The face value of the olive green stamp was 750 Ruble. As there was a rebasement of the Russion currency in 1998 I’m not sure whether it is still valid. It would however take some of them to stamp a letter i.e. to Western Europe. The stamp is a really plain and simple one and it’s exactly that fact which makes it to one of my favorites.