(...) vellum is an organic material, made of animal hide, and when it is stretched and dried for production, it is pulled along the lines of the animal's body. The skin never forgets the shape of its muscles, the location of its legs and heart and head, and as a result parchment cockles. The natural tension in each page, so that when parchment becomes too hot or cold or damp or dry, it moves. The books are, in this sense, very much alive. We restore them by applying heat and gentle pressure, relaxing the hides, allowing them to let go of traumatic memories. They need to be treated like breathing creatures, not stacked like the skulls in ossuaries. You hurt them by exposing them to the elements.

(...) vellum is an organic material, made of animal hide, and when it is stretched and dried for production, it is pulled along the lines of...

It seems that a woman without a tongue is just as powerful as one with one – perhaps even more so – as she does not have to waste time talking, and can spend most of her time thinking. This is a quandary for them, for it proves once again that a thinking woman is even worse than a speaking one. For the thinking woman came into the universe the most dangerous, the most hated of creatures, the worst enemy of man, for she desired something more than the immediate garden, something greater than the embrace of her father, and it was that impulse for knowledge, that terrible dirty impulse, that brought the human race into contact with Sin, and made us foul, and miserable and cruel, and so verily they insist that a thinking woman is worst of all, and for that they hate me and come after me and call me a great many names.

It seems that a woman without a tongue is just as powerful as one with one – perhaps even more so – as she does not have to waste time talki...