Nerds Republic

I still remember when I was told how sex works. The physical gymnastics seemed rather bizarre to me at the time, and I remember asking, “How did people figure that out?”

The early where-do-babies-come-from conversation is always a bit uncomfortable, and to aid bashful parents, many publishers produce books aimed at making the process a bit easier. But as an adult, you can’t look at some of them without cringing a little. Here’s one from the 1960s — complete with illustrations — that might bring you back to an uncomfortable memory from your childhood.

The book starts out with a nice metaphor about seeds and plants.

After that, it addresses animals. You know from their faces that those giraffes are about to get freaky.

And it really doesn’t censor itself much, although a child might be confused about what stacking chickens has to do with babies.

But it’s explained in full.

The text in the book is very straightforward without being too graphic. If you have to explain sex, this book actually does a pretty decent job. (All without using the word “cloaca.”)

It then teaches kiddos that their moms and dads were lying when they said that the dogs were “just playing.”

And finally, the book gets to the real topic: humans. These are humans.

Mom is super perky, so there’s that.

The actual mechanics are left for the kids to infer from the previous illustrations.

It’s somewhat lacking in the romance department, but you don’t even understand romance when you’re seven, so who cares?

After it discusses sex, the book talks about pregnancy and childbirth.

And it leaves out the gory aspects, of course.

You can tell by their hollow, soulless eyes that these kids just had “the talk.”

(via BuzzFeed)

You can also check this book out on Awful Library Books (a site that we highly recommend for all kinds of cringe), and see some reactions from people who endured this literary gem as kids.

Having frank conversations with kids about sex is healthy, and can help them make informed, safe decisions later in life. It also spares them some of the confusion and shame that goes along with repressing it. (But you might want to skip the chicken diagrams.)

Social media is a blessing and a curse. On one hand, it lets us connect with people all over the world and stay in touch with the friends and relatives we might otherwise lose contact with. On the other, it can be a terrifying swamp of embarrassing photos and oversharing. But there’s one thing that it surprisingly isn’t. And that’s new.

How can social media not be new? How can it not require the Internet? In fact, analogue versions of LinkedIn and Facebook have been around for centuries. They existed in the form of paper books called alba amicorum, in which people collected messages and images from friends and colleagues. They’ve been around for hundreds of years. Dutch historian Sophie Reinders studies these fascinating pieces of history.

These books were used by young men and women in Northern Europe to record and keep track of friendships and professional relationships.

The practice is thought to have begun in about 1560.

Alba amicorum literally means “friend book” in Latin.

These books were used by both boys and girls, but because of how society functioned in the 1600s, they used them for different reasons.

Boys were routinely sent on tours of Europe to study at famous universities and institutions, and to meet with great thinkers and scholars. They used their friend books kind of like the way we use LinkedIn — as a way of gaining professional connections.

These images come from the book of Michael van der Meer, who recorded his travels with impressive illustrations.

Some images depict members of the aristocracy.

And he apparently spent time with pretty ladies.

This might be an early version of the “It’s Complicated” relationship option.

While boys toured the continent, girls were usually sent to spend time in convents or to serve as ladies-in-waiting, which helped them break into the best social circles. They didn’t travel much, but they still used friend books.

Instead of notes from scientists and artists, the girls’ books were filled with correspondences between friends and admirers, inside jokes, and detailed accounts of social events. If the boys’ books were like LinkedIn, then the girls’ were like Facebook.

Juliana de Roussel’s friend book was beautifully decorated as well.

This one belonged to Jacoba Cornelia Bolten, who was a socialite during that time period.

These books are striking in their similarity to Facebook — it’s just that the technology was a bit different. Pictures were drawn, and instead of sharing articles, they wrote down their favorite proverbs, song lyrics, and poems. Many women even wrote their own poetry.

Married couples could also “update their status” by writing a joint note. (That’s right. Joint social media was a nauseating problem back then, too.)

Pages like this one from Margaretha Haghen’s book show guests recounting their time at a party.

One passage reads, “In Shrovetide, on day two / We guests wrote this for you / And could not leave for home / So tipsy we’d become / Love made us so besotted / We left nothing in the bottle.” I guess things haven’t really changed that much.

(via MessyNessyChic)

These networks between people help historians develop a clearer picture of what life was really like during this time period. From the connections in their books, they can even piece together 400-year-old relationships.

Next time you want to complain about those darn kids on Facebook, remember that people have been posting silly things for hundreds of years. You can learn more about them on Reinders’ website, and through the National Library of the Netherlands’ digitized collection of books.

Artist Su Blackwell illustrates books. That might not sound very unusual, but Blackwell’s illustrations turn books into detailed, haunting scenes — quite literally. That’s because the art she creates is made using the books themselves, the pages cut, folded, and pasted into intricate, three-dimensional scenes that capture not only the narrative, but the feeling of the books.

To Kill A Mockingbird, 2015

To Kill A mockingbird (detail), 2015

Using strategically placed lighting, the scenes glow with inner light that’s at once warm and lonely. Blackwell is drawn to solitary places, like the forests, coastlines, and isolated houses that make up so many folklore and fairy tale stories. She uses minimal color to emphasize certain items, but for the most part, the images keep the black and white print pattern, with shape and texture identifying them. Wires hold up some pieces, making them appear to float in midair.

The Stork Wife, 2014

Treasure Island, 2013

The Little Prince, 2012

Red Riding Hood, 2010

If her work seems a bit unsettling, it’s because Blackwell intends for it to be so, and strives to capture the full range of emotion covered by the stories. “I tend to lean towards young girl characters, placing them in haunting, fragile settings, expressing the vulnerability of childhood, while also conveying a sense of childhood anxiety and wonder,” she explains. “There is a quiet melancholy in the work, depicted in the material used, and choice of subtle color.”

The Last Unicorn, 2012

The Master and Margarita, 2014

The Lighthouse Keeper’s Cottage, 2014

The Dark is Rising, 2014

Wild Flowers of the British Isles, 2013

Some of them, like this book on wild flowers, are less emotionally complex and more a celebration of color and form.

As is always the case when artist carve up books, some people might think it’s a waste of readable material. However, most of the books that Blackwell uses are second-hand, out-of-date printings, hardly rare or collector’s items. She also reads each book, sometimes twice, in order to correctly capture it in sculpture. She also uses the destruction of the books as a way of making a point. “I employ this delicate, accessible medium and use irreversible, destructive processes to reflect on the precariousness of the world we inhabit and the fragility of our life, dreams and ambitions,” she says.

Matilda, 2014

The Ice Maiden, 2014

(via My Modern Met)

You can see more of Blackwell’s artwork, including non-literary works, on her website, where you can also purchase prints of her work.

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You’ve definitely been here before: you’ve reached a pause in your reading and, with no bookmark in sight, you simply fold the corner of a page down to keep your place. Perhaps a few passionate librarians even scolded you for it. But here’s what you probably didn’t know: you could have been making art out of those page folds.

Folding book pages is exactly how artist Yuto Yamaguchi creates his artwork.

Although it looks like the pages of these books have been carved, Yamaguchi makes it very clear that not a single page has been cut. His sculptures, which usually draw from pop culture and comic books for inspiration, are entirely made by folding the pages into intricate patterns.

To create these sculptures, Yamaguchi first draws up a detailed pattern for the folding process. By folding the pages back and forth multiple times, he can create the detailed, curving pieces from them — and each one is, technically, a temporary sculpture. By unfolding the pages, the book returns to its original, readable state.

(via Ufunk)

Yamaguchi encourages other people to explore the art of page folding for themselves, and has made his patterns available for purchase on his Etsy shop. You can also keep up with his latest projects on Instagram.