Nigel Beale The Biblio File

Zohran Mamdani: “A society that produces billionaires while millions go hungry isn’t successful; it’s broken. I don’t think we should have billionaires. Full stop.”

In a novel I wrote a long time ago, one character observes: "Americans will forgive a rich man anything, except collecting modern art. Then they think he's making fun of them."

Tony Fekete on Collecting Erotica, by @nigelbeale open.substack.com/pub/thebibliof…

I love Seong Ryul's work. And I love collecting exhibition catalogs from all over the world. #CatsuKollection

Sontag, Mendelsohn, and Collecting Erotica, by @nigelbeale open.substack.com/pub/thebibliof…

On Fountain Pens, Teapots and Collecting, by @nigelbeale open.substack.com/pub/thebibliof…

David McKnight on Collecting The Beatles - Latest Episode - The Biblio File podcast hosted by Nigel Beale - mailchi.mp/c0fa68b51de5/d…

@Will__Stern Speaking of exceptional provenance, can’t get better than this in the magazine world. x.com/GoldinCo/statu…

What is a lost art???? THIS. Magazines, posters, cereal boxes, diaries, special edition DVDs... the absolute joy of being able to buy and collect physical pieces of the things you’re passionate about.

This person has over 29,000 Pokémon items 🤯 Lisa Courtney fell in love with Pokémon at just 9 years old after spotting Pikachu in a Nintendo magazine. What started as a childhood obsession quickly turned into something much bigger, as she began collecting anything she could find tied to the franchise. Over the next 17 years, that passion grew into a record-breaking collection of more than 29,000 items, including trading cards, plush toys, clothing, and rare memorabilia from across the Pokémon universe. (via Lisa Courtney)

Check out my new Time Magazine featuring Admiral Ernest J. King! Released December 7, 1942 #WW2 #Collecting

In 2026, the Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College Chicago marks its 50th anniversary. The anniversary exhibition MoCP at Fifty: Collecting Through the Decades functions as a celebratory gesture and a enquiry into how institutions shape photographic history. Read More: aestheticamagazine.com/photography-po…

A while back, I started collecting magazines that match significant dates in my life. I’ve thumbed through this one dozens of times. “Dragon Magazine” #197 (TSR, Sept. 1993)” Cover art by Gerald Brom, “The Bedeviled Met His Fate” #ttrpgs #dungeonsanddragons #FantasyArt

Latest issue of Record Collector magazine #Punk

Vladimir Nabokov reflects on his lifelong obsession with collecting butterflies and moths. “Every hour and season had its delights,” he wrote, in 1948, about what it’s like to explore an ever-changing natural environment. nyer.cm/4saJArE

Geddy Lee of Rush donated 600 baseballs signed by Negro League players to the Negro League museum in Kansas City

Waterstones Children’s Laureate Frank Cottrell-Boyce has used his Laureate Lecture at the Royal Institution in London to call for urgent national action on the children’s reading crisis, as new research from BookTrust shows decline in daily shared readi... ebx.sh/AOP1r6

This hand-coloured plate from Edward Pretty’s A Practical Essay on Flower Painting in Water Colours (1812) showcases the delicate beauty of botanical illustration in the early nineteenth century.

Get off the phone and read a book. Last weekend I spent several hours going through Dante's Inferno and using Claude to reteach myself the lessons in it. You can do that now. You can have a genuine conversation with AI about one of the greatest works in human history and come out smarter than when you started. Instead most people are scrolling through 30-second videos that have absolutely nothing to do with their lives. Dopamine hits. That's all it is. You get to choose what goes into your head. Choose better.

Did Trump press Xi to release Jimmy Lai from prison like he promised during the campaign on the Hugh Hewitt radio show in 2024 when he said it would be “easy” for him to get Lai released if elected because of his “great relationship” with Xi. Any updates on that?

Lost in the news this week: the real story behind Palm Beach International becoming Trump International is not the renaming. It is the coercion that produced it and the extraordinary terms hidden inside the deal. County staff told commissioners that refusing would put state transportation funding and grant assurances at risk. DeSantis has already removed state attorneys and school board members who crossed him. That is the climate one Democratic commissioner cast her deciding vote in. And the agreement itself is not a normal honorary naming. The Trump family company retains the right to pick vendors, license the name to third parties, and sell branded merchandise off-site. This is not an honor bestowed as much as it is a shakedown. theguardian.com/us-news/2026/m…