Books

Through the Looking Glass Chess Set

In ‘Alice through the Looking Glass’ by Lewis Carroll, Alice falls through a mirror and on the other side of the mirror, she becomes a piece in a game of chess. Inspired by this, the chess pieces have an opaque mirror finish, when they touch the surface of the board they magically turn transparent and reveal the identity of the piece contained inside them. When removed from the board they revert to being opaque, hiding the identity of the piece.

This is a comment on how a chess piece has no value unless it is in play on the board. If removed from the board, a pawn and a queen are equal, in that neither have any value.

A Chess Set inspired by the novel ‘Alice through the Looking Glass’ where the pieces magically turn transparent when they touch the board.

The theme of ‘Alice through the Looking Glass’ is the difference between the real world and the world behind the mirror. In keeping with this theme there is a contrast between the unlit mirrored piece and the clear glass piece. Each unlit mirrored piece is a smooth and modern shape. Each lit piece is clear glass, with the negative shape of a traditional, delicate Staunton chess piece enclosed within it. In the book the White Knight talks about how he thinks better when he is upside down. In a reference, the White Knights in the set only work when they are placed upside down. This joke is hidden to all but those who know the background of the chess set

The Chessboard is made out of LightPoints a material manufactured by Schott, which is glass that has LED’s embedded in it; the pieces are coated with Mirona, a Material that turns transparent when light shines through it. When the piece is placed on the board it completes the circuit and lights up the LED under it turning it transparent, like magic.

This product was designed by Yasmin Sethi in response to a brief set by Schott UK Ltd. for Final year students of Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design.

via Yasmin Sethi Design

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1. There's an underground economy of boosted books. These values are commonly understood and roundly agreed upon through word of mouth, and the values always seem to be true. Once, a scruffy, large man approached me, holding a folded-up piece of paper. "Do you have any Buck?" He paused and looked at the piece of paper. "Any books by Buckorsick?" I suspected that he meant Bukowski, but I played dumb, and asked to see the piece of paper he was holding. It was written in crisp handwriting that clearly didn't belong to him, and it read: 1. Charles Bukowski 2. Jim Thompson 3. Philip K. Dick 4. William S. Burroughs 5. Any Graphic Novel

   This is pretty much the authoritative top five, the New York Times best-seller list of stolen books. Its origins still mystify me..

   I asked the man whether he preferred Bukowski's Pulp to his Women, as I did, and whether his favorite Thompson book was The Getaway or The Killer Inside Me. First the book chatter made him nervous, but then it made him angry... Continue reading Flying Off the Shelves by Paul Constant | via The Stranger Any booksellers reading this?  I'm curious about the how the lists might compare from store to store, city to city... Not surprised Buk is at the top of this one, however.  But where is Hoffman?  Surprising omission.

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