PocketBook - Print & fold your own pocket-sized Gutenberg classics
Turn Project Gutenberg books into very compact versions, to print on standard A4, fold to pocket size, and carry around to read anywhere.
The python script downloads the html version of a book and converts it into a pdf with minimised margins, tiny font size, no page breaks etc to fit as much text on paper as possible.
The minified pages are arranged to be printed on standard office paper and folded into a booklet the size of a credit card.
Sample books
The books directory contains a few books ready to print (see below for folding instructions)
- Lewis Carroll: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
- HG Wells: The War of the Worlds
- Marcus Aurelius: Meditations
- Fyodor Dostoyevsky: Notes from the Underground
Make your own pocket book
Install
Clone the repository
git clone git@github.com:sieste/pocketbook.git
cd pocketbook
Create a python virtual environment and install required libraries
python -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt
Run
Copy the book's "Download HTML (zip)" url from Project Gutenberg:
Run the python script on the download link:
./pocketbook.py https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/36/pg36-h.zip
## Extracted to: /tmp/tmpzpp6533v
## Creating pdf /tmp/tmpzpp6533v/pg36-images.pdf
## Done.
## Creating booklet ...
## Booklet PDF created: The_War_of_the_Worlds-booklet.pdf
(Alternatively, download the zip file and run the script on the local file ./pocketbook.py path/to/downloaded/pg36-h.zip)
Print & Fold
Print out on regular A4 office paper (one- or two-sided, margins as small as possible). Then cut & fold each page using the "zine fold":
(Printing two-sided creates smaller books but you have to re-fold after reading 8 pages.)
Make a sleeve
I use recycled cardboard and string to bind my pocket book. Just slide the individual booklets through loops of string wrapped around the cardboard sleeve like this:
