8:13 AM :: Stephen (contact)

Rare Books: Daniel Drezner recently described an encounter in L.A., in which he asked a television actor for an autograph

on the only blank piece of paper I had -- the back cover to Steven Pinker's The Blank Slate....

So I now own the ultimate academic geek artifact -- a copy of The Blank Slate autographed by a Buffy the Vampire Slayer cast member.

His post reminded me how many years ago, under similarly inadvertent circumstances, I came to possess Earth's only copy of Madame Bovary autographed by folk singer Arlo Guthrie. He was playing Duluth, and a group of Camp Nebagamon staffers decided to bring their campers on a field trip. I had never heard of him before, but hey, he was giving autographs, and it was the only paper I had.

How much could I get for it on eBay? Doesn't matter; I'm not selling.


UPDATE: Actor Van Heflin, who played Charles Bovary in the 1949 movie version, was born on Dec. 13, 1910. "Alice's Restaurant," the famous hit by Arlo Guthrie, was released on Dec. 13, 1969. Coincidence? I think not.

UPDATE #2: The longest gap on the Nixon Watergate tapes was 18 1/2 minutes long. The 1969 recording of "Alice's Restaurant" was 18 1/2 minutes long. Coincidence? I think not. (As Arlo told us in Duluth, "Music can bring down governments!")