{"id":69884,"date":"2014-04-17T17:47:27","date_gmt":"2014-04-17T21:47:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=69884"},"modified":"2014-04-17T18:01:34","modified_gmt":"2014-04-17T22:01:34","slug":"frozen-books","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/04\/17\/frozen-books\/","title":{"rendered":"Frozen Books"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"wet<\/a>

Wet Books<\/i>, Richard Cubitt<\/p><\/div>\n

Someone has posted the following to Reddit:<\/p>\n

\n

My roommate gets distracted sometimes, and she misplaced her book in the freezer. I\u2019m not making this up.<\/p>\n

The pages are warped from moisture and most of them are frozen solid in a block.<\/p>\n

How can we save the book?<\/p>\n

Thanks!<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Cue the Fahrenheit 451<\/em> jokes\u2014lots of them. But there were also plenty of practical tips to help the poster with his or her wacky dilemma. These include (but are not limited to) blotting the pages with paper towels and\/or rice; allowing the book to dry in a cool room so as to slow melting; rubbing the paper with vinegar to prevent mildew; and, if all else fails and the poster deems the book worth it, investing in a vacuum pump and creating an at-home distiller. <\/p>\n

As one knowledgeable person explained,<\/p>\n

\n

This is how books are salvaged from flooding on a commercial scale. They are frozen in the short run (with industrial freezers, if needs be, such as if a pipe breaks in a library), and stuffed into freeze driers which operate on a vacuum principle: the water sublimes, going straight from solid to vapor, while the book is still frozen, preventing any significant microbial growth if done correctly.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

I can\u2019t pretend to have ever forgotten a book in the freezer, but time was, I often left books out overnight in my family\u2019s yard, and found them warped and damp with dew or rain. Plenty of them are warped to this day, but a great aid in such cases was the old book press my dad picked up at a tag sale when I was about twelve. These devices\u2014ours was made of wood and had a black metal crank\u2014are used by those who deal with rare books, but believe me, they work just as well (if not better) with the paperback copy of The Wolves of Willoughby Chase<\/em> you picked up at the local library sale.<\/p>\n

I have nothing against the occasional e-book. And I certainly understand the beauty and dignity of an exquisite edition, and the pleasure of filling your shelves with volumes in pristine condition. But personally\u2014because I am hard on objects, and I lug reading material wherever I go, and, yesterday, I discovered that a Clinique Chubby Stick had come uncapped in my tote and stained everything with \u201cPudgy Peony\u201d\u2014I love physical volumes for their sheer durability<\/em>. I like that a book can live through coffee spills and tears (both kinds) and ballpoint pens and, if necessary, the occasional smashed Cadbury Creme Egg, forgotten at the bottom of one\u2019s bag.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think I\u2019d go so far as the poster who suggested, \u201cYou could get some used $.50 books and try a few different methods while keeping the important book frozen.\u201d But I like that the possibility exists. As long as books survive in paper and ink, it will be partly because they can also be just this side of disposable\u2014because some will be found, and end up, on a neighbor\u2019s stoop, or at the local thrift store. Because some deserve to.<\/p>\n

\nThat said, if anyone knows how to extract moisturizing lip gloss from the pages of a library book, I would very much like to know.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Someone has posted the following to Reddit: My roommate gets distracted sometimes, and she misplaced her book in the freezer. I\u2019m not making this up. The pages are warped from moisture and most of them are frozen solid in a block. How can we save the book? Thanks! Cue the Fahrenheit 451 jokes\u2014lots of them. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13115],"tags":[13590,13591,13589,6871,13588,13587],"class_list":["post-69884","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-our-daily-correspondent","tag-frozen-books","tag-print-editions","tag-print-versus-digital","tag-reddit","tag-rehabilitating-books","tag-wet-books"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nHow to Save Frozen Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Sadie Stein on print vs. digital and the the sheer durability of paper and ink.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/04\/17\/frozen-books\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Frozen Books by Sadie Stein\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"April 17, 2014 \u2013 Someone has posted the following to Reddit: My roommate gets distracted sometimes, and she misplaced her book in the freezer. 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