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A few years ago the death of the printed book was being foretold: the rise ofthe e-book would send publishing the way of the music industry. Everybodywould be buying digitally, profit margins would be slashed, and amazon wouldhave destroyed all the bookshops. This is a book caption So far that hasnt happened, though the disintegration of the bookshop seems tobe in hand. Sales of printed books have fallen and will probably continue to fall, but it is a complicated picture, with intriguing variations. While novels have losta lot of physical sales to e-books as much as 70 per cent for...

The Art of Cards Cards in the Arts The Card Players by Paul Cézanne holds second place in the rankings of most expensive paintings in history, since it was famously bought for $274 million by the kingdom of Qatar in 2011. The impressionist masterpiece was painted in 1893 and features two stony-faced card players, models selected by Cézanne from his family’s estate outside Aix-en-Provence: the gardener and a farm hand. Museum Worthy Cards France, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg and Japan all house museums solely dedicated to the playing card. The collection of The Miike Playing-Card Memorial Museum in Omuta includes very...