Contact The Editor
Articles By This Author
• After having lurked quietly on the shelves of Harvard's Houghton Library for the better part of a century, the philosophical meditation "Des Destinees de l'Ame" has undergone a facelift, according to a statement issued by the library.
The book was acquired by the school in 1934, along with a note explaining the process of preserving human skin.
The book's previous owner, an eccentric French bibliophile named Dr. Ludovic Bouland, claimed to have added the "human touch" (read: human skin) to his prize because "a book about the human soul deserved to have a human covering."
The cover's origin could not be confirmed until 2014, and NBC News reported that this eventually led to an ethical review in 2023 and the recent decision to rebind the book in something less macabre.