Back To The Books

It has not escaped my notice that the bibliophile aspect of this blog has shifted gears radically. A perusal of posts only a few months ago will reveal an abiding interest in collecting first editions and ephemera of Edward Gorey. It was, in fact, a monomaniacal pursuit and shows that when it comes to collecting something I tend to do nothing by halves. As far as Edward Gorey goes, however, I have hit an impasse or, rather, a critical junction. The Gorey books I would need now are all of the very spendy types, his limited edtions. These run for around $500 a piece. As much as I love Gorey's works and as much as I'd like to own The Grand Passion, if I'm going to spend that much, I'd much rather get a first edition of Oscar Wilde's Salome or something by William Morris. So, for now at least, collecting Gorey has been put on hold.

As you can see by the recent postings, my book collecting has shifted to the equally monomanical pursuit of books published by Thomas B. Mosher, the Pirate Prince of Publishers from Portland, Maine. In fact, I have some new additions to my collection, one of which has revealed some rather important facts to me and refined my Mosher-collecting. But we'll get to those later.

What I now propose is to leaven the bibliophilic postings with the following two new additions.

The Rubaiyat of Bridge, by Carolyn Wells, illustrations by May Wilson Preston, published by Harper & Brothers Publishing, 1910.
In a previous post I mentioned The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam had reached a height of popularity in the late 1890s and early 1900s that bordered on hysteria. There were Omar societyies formed in North America and Europe, odes written about The Rubaiyat and Omar ... and parodies. The Rubaiyat of Bridge is one such parody. A charming book done in the style of the Fitzgerald translation with equally charming illustrations. One of those nifty little books that one takes down from the shelf periodically and which makes you feel all the better for having done so.

Little Journeys, Great Musicians, Book II, by Elbert Hubbard, published by the Roycrofters, 1901.
I always enjoy picking up a new Roycroft book. Not only adding a new edition to my collection, but I mean picking up a Roycroft book. The feel of the limp suede covers, the texture of the hand-made paper, the typographic designs by Denslow or Dard Hunter, the visual delight of Hubbard's words laid out on the page. A Roycroft book is a delight to the senses (well, some of them at least. You can't really hear it unless you rifle the pages and you'd be foolish to try eating it), and it's not going far to say that they exceed even William Morris as The Book Beautiful. This is a special edition of Elbert Hubbard's Little Journeys series, bound in limp suede with an embossed title on the fromt cover and on the spine, hand-made paper, illustrations tipped in and ... hand illuminated title page, borders and decorative initials by Edna B. Hammersmith. This is number 648 of 940 copies. One hundred and four years on, the illuminations shine with a vivid glow against the gorgeously thick, creamy hand-made paper. An amazingly beuatiful book.