As a librarian, the constant use of library & archives in horror and fantasy works gives me infinite joy but also makes me a little sad because I’ve never stumbled across a cursed tome or found a criminal confession while digitizing a tape 😔
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How can you be sure? Maybe the tome offers the infinite knowledge of the universe, but the curse is that the reader immediately forgets everything, including the existence of the tome, as soon as they close the cover and set it aside.
You might want to read (or reread) The Aleph by Borges. You can't stop looking. One day you're going to trip and fall and you'll open your eyes and you'll be staring at it. But if you aren't looking for it then you won't find it. You will only ever find what you're looking for.
Are you sure you didn't? Who has been messing with cursed scrolls or whatnot. Because somebody did? Where's our real life Harry Potter. Safe us from we don't say it's name. The one with the smallest crowds. And take the Italian lady and the others dementors with you.
Yeah, I hear ya.Maybe you should just start leaving cryptic notes in the books. Like, "The real treasure is buried under the Dewey Decimal system." Then you can finally live out your fantasy novel dreams. Just don't blame me when the library gets overrun with ghost hunters.
It’s not a very accurate representation of the work, tbh. With digitization, you do have to play the material through, but you don’t typically just sit there and listen to it lol
It wasn’t the only reason I wanted to work in an archive—just piqued my interest
Transcribing written documents and uploading them to databases furthered my interest
That’s often the work of digitization assistants, which could be a really fun way to get into the field! They don’t usually require an advanced degree, so it’s way more accessible to try out as a job 💕
I long imagined the Vatican Library's secret vaults contained many tomes of ancient lore and arcane power, hidden from the unworthy eyes of mere mortals. Now, I suspect it's just stacks of dusty accounts and ledgers, hidden to cover up fraud, extortion, and abuse.
I’m disappointed for you. If I ever kill anyone I’ll write my confession & hide it away in a little noticed text of the fantasy genre. Be on the look out because people annoy me on the daily & I could snap at any moment.
College librarian was Hungarian, dark hair, accent & a fan of opera and vintage styles, so even small live opera got full tux & cape. He stopped in a couple times after to check on something, so late & dark. His well intended “good evening” had pretty much the opposite of the intended outcome
While the really bad stuff ist locked up, just the size and scope of our collection is a garantee that we have some really scary stuff. But until now I haven't had the urge to intensionally look for those.
It would move around my room on its own and end up in the weirdest locations. Twice it vanished completely and I shuffled to the library to apologise only for the librarian to check and find it was on the shelf, but hadn't been registered on the computer. It vanished so much I never finished it!
Truuuuueee I worked in a film archive and it’s in this environmentally controlled vault that’s completely isolated from the outside world and it’s was kinda creepy!
I crave to be the archival assistant who works more in the basements of the archives & is just known as the gremlin no one ever sees...but occasionally they leave cups of tea right outside the door & it's always found emptied 😂
I don't need to find the spooks of the archive/library..I AM the spook
I am also incredibly disappointed that the majority of old leather-bound books appear to be out-of-date encyclopedias and not some variety of Necronomicon.
As a child I would *repeatedly* get lost in the stacks at our very large local library, and I NEVER found a mysterious book of spells OR a portal to a magical world where my elementary-school education and hyperfixated encyclopedia-reading would make me a pivotal figure. Dreams die hard.
I mean CONCEPTUALLY it was founded in the 1880s but the physical *structure* was from the 1960s, so at the time it was either a century or a couple decades old depending on how you count.
I always assumed it was just book density, information warping spacetime, that sort of thing...
You gotta find the right book in the back of the archives which, when you pull it forward, reveals a secret passage obviously. That's where all the tomes and grimoires are.
This is *exactly* the kind of post a deep cover Librarian working for a Secret and Slightly Sinister Government Agency would use to put us off their track. :-)
There were some actual occult manuscripts in the collection where I worked, but we never (well, I was never involved if so) tried summoning up the demons according to the rituals. In works of fiction the horror that strikes me is the total lack of following of correct archival practices.
"This is best of the 80s, Tape 1, side 1. First song--
SCHWRRRWZT!
Okay, I'm recording over this tape to bring you something really important."
"OMG I found one!"
"My first demo song 'I love me', which I'm sure will be a hit for the ages."
"...oh...no..."
"*off-tune chords*"
"OH...NO!"
Back in my library days, I got very adept at installing magnetic strips and gluing errata into bound journals (academic science library). But a depressing lack of cursed tomes.
Wife's cataloger, almost exclusively working with digital materials. Sometimes she gets fun B-movies (or "worse").
Once found "The Psychic Life of Micro-Organisms" (an original edition from 1913) and had a good time chuckling about telekinetic amoebae and ESPer bacteria.
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As long as they do it nice and peaceful like! ;)
The 100-200 year old teeth were pretty stark to see.
Transcribing written documents and uploading them to databases furthered my interest
Otherwise who else would store them in large public buildings to lure in victims
Check with Henry Sotheran, Ltd, to whom it seems to happen pretty regularly, "no-cursed-items" policy or not:
https://twitter.com/Sotherans/status/1666772191700975618
I don't need to find the spooks of the archive/library..I AM the spook
I always assumed it was just book density, information warping spacetime, that sort of thing...
SCHWRRRWZT!
Okay, I'm recording over this tape to bring you something really important."
"OMG I found one!"
"My first demo song 'I love me', which I'm sure will be a hit for the ages."
"...oh...no..."
"*off-tune chords*"
"OH...NO!"
Come on now, we all know you hold the tome of secrets.
Wife's cataloger, almost exclusively working with digital materials. Sometimes she gets fun B-movies (or "worse").
Once found "The Psychic Life of Micro-Organisms" (an original edition from 1913) and had a good time chuckling about telekinetic amoebae and ESPer bacteria.
Also, it made me jealous because i think that would be a great gig