During our next open day for our storefront, Aug. 13, we’re throwing a special “reading party” for the forthcoming “Roubo on Furniture.” You’ll get an advance look at the book and get to read some of the great stuff the authors have dug up from “l’Art du menuisier.”
At the party, we’re going to have the translated text for all 97 plates of “Roubo on Furniture” printed out plus a big jar of red pens. To help, we’ll also have a bunch of copies of “The Book of Plates,” the original 18th century French volumes and my library of woodworking books, which includes a French woodworking dictionary.
Oh, and we’ll have free beer and snacks.
The storefront is located at 837 Willard St., Covington, Ky., 41017. Our hours for that day will be 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
If you can attend, we’ll set you up to look for typos or other errors in the text (we have found multiple cases where Roubo refers to the wrong figures in the plates and we are trying to clean that up). The text for each plate takes about 30 to 40 minutes to read carefully.
For every plate that you edit, we’ll give you a nicely printed commemorative postcard. And a free beer.
The text for this book has already been edited many times by the authors, Megan Fitzpatrick, Wesley Tanner and me. But we haven’t performed a final copy edit on the text where we root out all the nasty language gremlins. So your help with this will be greatly appreciated.
If you can attend, leave a note in the comments section so we know how much beer to bring.
I’m afraid we cannot do this over the Internet. We are not ready to send out this text into the unknown, where people can post it before it’s ready for the public. Apologies, but we’re immovable on that point.
— Christopher Schwarz
What a great, fun idea. I wish I were closer so I could join.
Wish I could make it person! In the unlikely event you don’t get enough help, and find a way to do this by correspondence (mailing hard copies with a signed non-disclosure agreement?), please keep me in mind. My job is about 80% writing and editing and I would love to help. If not for this, maybe for future projects.
Interesting idea. A variant of how the OED was compiled. Could entail a lot of coordination if a lot of people were involved.
Have you read “The Professor and the Madman?” Excellent book on that.
That is a great one!
I read “The Meaning of Everything” also by Simon Winchester on the same subject. The P & M is on my reading list now. Thanks for the recommendation.
I will come down for a while. I will also bring cream soda from Carillon Brewery
That will ensure that Megan actually shows up!
tee hee…i added the “actually” (please don’t take away my edit access!)
[Power corrupts. -Ed.]
Fantastic! Please have coffee, it’s going to take me 36 hours to drive there.
Beer goggles for proofreading — who wouldn’t want to do that?
There’s something about proof-reading and free beer that I just can’t put my finger on… it’ll come to me later. Probably best not to try it over the Internet – Internet beer is pretty weak sauce.
First you proofread, then you get your beer.
Yes – bourbon while proofreading, then beer after.
Spoken like a true professional.
Is Irish whiskey acceptable or have I been doing it wrong?
Eh – It’s an OK fallback. (My Irish ancestors moved to KY a long time ago.)
First page, first beer sounds kool – multiple pages, multiple beers – maybe not so much, But I salute – and toast – your efforts and wish the enterprise well – the community will put ‘er through.
et merde! comment ca se fait qu’il y a presque personne qui s’interesse a Roubo ici en europe? je reve d’un evenement cool comme ca près de chez moi!
Quelle dommage!
Trying to make this work for me, what is the cutoff date to notify you we are coming?
10 minutes before we begin. Any and all help is appreciated.
Thank you for opening your workshop up for such an opportunity. I look forward to putting my experience of editing my manuscripts and those of my graduate students to work on such a unique woodworking publication. Count me in.
Ok, I gotta ask, do you have to read French to be a contributor on the plate number to text reference thing?
I may be in the area that weekend and will have about 6 hours to kill if the plan comes together.
No French necessary!
You’ll be reading the English translation – looking for English typos. We’ll have the French originals on hand to double check errors we might find.
Here’s a typical example: Roubo says to look at Fig. A to see a box. But Fig. A is not a box, it’s a stick. So we check the French original to see if it really says to look at Fig. A (Roubo messed up) or the French original says to look at Fig. B, which is a box (we messed up).
You don’t need to know French to do that.
We’ve found about 10 errors that Roubo made across the 97 plates.
Hope you can make it!
There’s no way for me to physically be in the area, but if you end up needing remote eyes on the work I’m happy to pitch in.
At first I was doing the math: 1 beer every 30 minutes times 7 hours is … 14 free beers. Imagine my disappointment when I got to, “First you proofread, then you get your beer.”
Now 13 beers hardly seems worth it, so I guess I won’t come.
I can be there. LAP has done so much to improve my woodworking, I would love to give something back.
Thanks!
I’ve made arrangements to fly through on my way from Seattle (home) to Philly (childhood home). Any special requests for things from the PNW? We specialize in evergreens, IPA’s, coffee and rain.
Wow.
Just bring a sharp eye. We’ll supply the rest.
Thanks!
Count me in! Looking forward to seeing everybody.
Wes Faulkenberry, Jr.
I’ll be there. Sounds fun.