by Laura Massey on August 24, 2010
Does anyone know what this is? (Click to enlarge.)
All we know is that it’s the most interesting page from a 19th-century scrapbook we recently acquired. And to be honest, the mystery is probably more fun than learning the truth, as the last couple of days have been dominated by discussions of “what the wheel is for” (he runs along an electric tram track, obviously) and “why does he have a sponge cake on his head?” August is a slow month in the book trade.
Even disregarding the silly picture the scrapbook is great. The hobby was incredibly popular–as early as the late 18th century stationers were selling blank books for people to fill with prints and other ephemera, and it remained an important activity for young women throughout the nineteenth century.
This particular book was produced in 1829 (according to the title page), and the binding is typical of the period: red half skiver, a form of cheap, thin leather produced from the inner side of a sheepskin. We can tell that this scrapbook was well cared for because the fragile skiver has not deteriorated. The book’s condition and the obvious care taken in cutting out, placing, and coloring the scraps within it indicate that it was a much-loved item.
One of the most interesting parts of the book is the title page, itself an ephemeral item that was meant to be removed by the purchaser. It’s unusual to find one intact, and this example is a typographic masterpiece, weaving together a variety of typefaces including the tiniest I’ve ever seen forming decorative curls around the larger phrases. Definitely click to enlarge!
There’s also a guide, in case you can’t read the very tiny text! It’s been pasted into the very back of the book.
The contents of the scrapbook date from the end of the 1700s to at least the 1850s, with some items entered at the time of their publication and others culled from older books or periodicals. The compiler seems to have had an interest in fashion, devoting a number of pages to fashion plates, and in many cases cutting out individual figures and carefully combining them in hand-coloured vignettes, as below. This was a common practice of scrapbookers during the period.
Also popular with this compiler was a series of prints depicting South American people, produced by John Skinner in 1805. Each individual and caption was delicately cut from the original print and pasted into the scrapbook.
Either the compiler or a family member or friend was an amateur artist, and many pages are filled with humorous original sketches and visual puns. The kind of innocuous things you can imagine as the result of parlor games, though that “scotch crab” is kind of freaking me out.
There are lots of engravings of tourist attractions and scenic areas. The borders around these have been hand-painted:
There are quite a lot of these very dull, very badly written, moralistic poems and vignettes. Was our compiler the Ned Flanders of the 1850s?
Then there are some entries that are more random – things that happened to catch the eye of the compiler. Like our strange wheeled friend above.
Scrapbooks, as well as being entertaining, are a great resource for understanding the viewpoints and leisure pursuits of middle and upper class women during the nineteenth century. I can’t help but wonder what historians of the future would make of the wall behind my desk, covered in postcards, clipped out comic strips, silly notes from colleagues, and the wrappers to French sweets.
by Laura Massey on August 16, 2010
We recently had an exciting request from the BBC – they were preparing a documentary on modern novelists and wanted to film first edition copies of all the books featured in the show. We were able to provide beautiful copies of almost all the novels, and our shop hosted the film crew for two very fun days of shooting.
The series is titled In Their Own Words: British Novelists, and it focuses on archival footage and recordings of the authors, including:
…the only recording of Virginia Woolf in existence, as well as surprising set-pieces: William Golding addressing a room of primary school pupils about Lord Of The Flies; JG Ballard, author of Crash, celebrating the beauty of the motorcar; and Kingsley Amis and John Braine in a smoke-filled Soho restaurant discussing the impact of the Second World War on the British novel.
The first episode, covering the interwar years, premieres tonight at 9 on BBC Four, with two more to follow in the coming weeks. So if you’re wondering what to do with your evenings now that Sherlock has finished, definitely check it out. And if you’re interested in the books featured in the show then have a look at the latest Peter Harrington catalogue, which covers our modern literature stock (contact us to request a paper copy, or view the digital version which will be available online later tonight).
Below, BBC staff prepare to film while owner Pom Harrington (right) looks on:
Filming The Golden Notebook, by Doris Lessing:
by Laura Massey on July 28, 2010
Peter Harrington’s quirkiest recent acquisition, this is a pamphlet produced by the Doughnut Corporation of America just after World War II. Aimed at returning servicemen in search of business opportunities, it explains in detail how they can open their own shop using automatic doughnut machines and mixes produced by the DCA. According to the introduction:
It is but natural that the great activity of the good old American donut in this World War II where fresh cooked donuts (made in automatic machines) followed our boys on all battle fronts, often close to the front lines… should prompt the Service Men to investigate the possibilities with donuts in civilian life.
The pamphlet opens with images of fighting men enjoying “a taste of home and the pleasant things they left behind”. (Click to enlarge.)
The Doughnut Corporation of America was founded during the inter-war years by Adolph Levitt, who owned a chain of bakeries. Seeing potential in the doughnut business he invested in the development of an automatic doughnut machine that could be sold to independent shops, and in 1925 he began offering the first standardized mixes for the machines with trade names such as Downyflake and Mayflower. (His was also the first company to use the spelling variation “donut”.)
The DCA soon monopolized American doughnut production, as this November 1940 article in TIME points out:
U. S. doughnut sales were estimated at some $78,000,0000 last year (up from $5,000,000 in 1920), and 80% of these doughnuts were made on Doughnut Corp. machines. More than 30% were also made from Doughnut Corp. mix. Its largest factory (in Ellicott City, Md.) operates now 20 hours a day, has some 2,000 employes. Doughnut Corp. is boss of the doughnut world.
The back of the pamphlet definitely gives the impression of a monolithic corporation:
The figures on doughnut production mentioned in the TIME article above may have come directly from the DCA, as they offer the same ones at the beginning of the pamphlet:
The bulk of the pamphlet is composed of questions and answers about doughnut retail sales – 75 questions in total, with an index! They range from the basic:
… to more complex issues such as location, operating costs, doughnut output, potential profits, and the running of the doughnut machines, making the pamphlet an interesting historical document. This page gives an idea of doughnut shop operating costs in 1944, with an estimated profit per dozen of 11 cents.
Below, the doughnut machine, which could make 480 doughnuts per hour. An early example of the shift to mechanized and processed food that began in earnest in the 1950s:
In addition to serving a practical purpose, the machines were marketing tools that generated visual interest in shop windows, and the use of national trade names and corporate marketing materials presaged the rise of fast food and the corporatization of eating.
One of the best things about the pamphlet is that many of the pages are decorated with photos of real doughnut shops and lunch counters. A fantastic look at period style and the design of eateries. Though I have my doubts about the pineapple doughnuts advertised in the second picture.
by Laura Massey on July 26, 2010
Earlier his week Peter Harrington acquired a first edition of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven and Other Poems, published in New York in 1845. “The Raven” had become an instant success when it was first printed in the magazine American Review in January 1845, and its publication in book form has been described as ”the most important volume of poetry that had been issued up until that time in America” (Allen, p. 667). The book was originally in cloth, but this copy was rebound in classic New York style brown morocco by Stikeman & Co. at the turn of the twentieth century – beautiful binding that compliments the book’s origin.
Even more intriguing than the book itself, our copy is paired with a small Poe manuscript, part of a literary review that wasn’t published until after his death when it was included in his collected works.
It reads “Among the author’s less elaborate compositions, however, “The Angel’s Visit”, written since the publication of her “Child of the Sea”, is perhaps, upon the whole the best – although “The Forsaken” and “La Vega” are scarcely, if at all, inferior”.
In addition to the fame gained from his poetry and short stories (and despite his instability and alcoholism), Poe was regarded as an insightful and acerbic literary critic. Contemporary essayist James Russell Lowell called him “the most discriminating, philosophical, and fearless critic upon imaginative works who has written in America” (Quinn p. 659). In this case, however, Poe may have blunted his literary judgment in light of the fact that the poet, Sarah Ann Lewis, regularly helped to care for his dying wife Virginia.
But in addition to the piece’s literary and biographical issues, a more prosaic question arises: why is this small piece of paper separated from the rest of the review? The answer is simple, if disturbing to many bibliophiles – his editor did it. It was common practice during the nineteenth century to cut up the manuscripts of celebrated authors and sell the pieces as souvenirs, a slightly less macabre version of saints’ relics. The same thing was done to some of John Keats’s work.
In this case the culprit was probably John R. Thompson, the editor of the Southern Literary Messenger, which had published several of Poe’s essays, including an earlier review of Lewis’s poetry. Thompson also published Poe’s The Rationale of Verse, and later he distributed pieces of it, sometimes adding his own identifying notes (the number 5 on the review above may well be in his hand). Nine fragments of that essay are still known, scattered to various institutions and collections, with one selling for $30,000 at Christie’s in 2009.
So our set comprising first edition and manuscript is an interesting record not only of the author and his publication history, but the fashion for literary relics. I haven’t been able to locate any other pieces of this particular review in previous sales records; if you know of any we would love to hear about them. To see many more Poe manuscripts and texts visit the websites of the excellent Susan Jaffe Tane Poe Collection at Cornell and the Edgar Allan Poe Digital Collection at the Harry Ransom Center.
by Laura Massey on June 25, 2010
This week Peter Harrington is exhibiting at the Masterpiece Fair, “a unique showcase for the most covetable objects in the world: traditional and modern, old and new, from the finest of fine and decorative art to the best of wines, classic cars, jewellery and contemporary design.”
This is a fabulous event and not to be missed if you’re interested in art, design, and antiques. Contact us for complimentary tickets so you can ogle the Chronophage, enjoy the champagne, and say hello to us in booth A20. The fair is at the Chelsea Barracks and is open to the public between 10.00 and 20.00 from today through the 29th.
Our display:
by Laura Massey on June 24, 2010
Do you know a lot about maps? Would you like to work in a friendly shop in beautiful Chelsea?
Peter Harrington are looking for an energetic, flexible person for a full-time role in their Chelsea/South Kensington gallery selling rare maps and prints, books and atlases. Demonstrable knowledge of antique maps and atlases required.
The role involves buying and selling stock, organizing exhibitions and supervising general display.
Dealing ability, enthusiasm and hard work will be rewarded with excellent salary and bonus incentives.
CV and letter to Ms Gray Jordan, Peter Harrington, 100 Fulham Road, London SW3 6HS Email: gray@peterharrington.co.uk
by Laura Massey on June 22, 2010
Inspiration Against Despair
This is one of our most exciting recent purchases, a hand-coloured leaf from a fifteenth-century block book known as the Ars Moriendi (The Art of Dying).
Book technology and the transition between script and print are special interests of mine, so I was enthusiastic when this item arrived at the shop. My modern literature colleague challenged me to explain was so special about it, and the first thing that came to mind was:
“It’s the Betamax of printing.”
I know. Comparing a fifteenth-century book to a defunct home video technology from the era of leotards and big hair is a bit underwhelming. But they’re both part of a long tradition of semi-failed innovations that are interesting for what they can tell us about the history of technological development. In the case of Betamax, social, legal, and technological issues made the system obsolete nearly as soon as it got off the ground, giving the advantage to the rival VHS format, but leaving a legacy that is still useful in understanding the ways innovation occurs. Likewise, the lasting value of block books rests in what they can tell us about printing and the consumption of texts during the late middle ages.
Block books were a sideline in the world of early printing, appearing concurrently with Gutenberg’s invention in the 1450s and 60s. Movable type and the printing press had their origins in metalworking and wine pressing. Block books, on the other hand, developed from the use of wood engravings to cheaply and quickly print fabrics, devotional items, and playing cards. Each block book was composed of individual prints that were produced by rubbing a wood engraving against paper, and they were often hand-coloured. What little text was included was usually incorporated directly into the engraving, a delicate and time-consuming process, but worthwhile because the prints could be mass produced without the capital outlay required for type.
Most block books were simplified versions of older texts that had circulated as manuscripts. The Ars Moriendi is a guide to dying righteously by avoiding sins such as despair, pride and impatience on the deathbed. It’s images are first recorded in a manuscript from the 1420s (today held at the Welcome Library), which were later engraved by an anonymous artisan from the upper Rhine. Several versions exist, and our example is particularly rare as it is one of only two leaves known to survive from this edition. The illustration on this particular leaf is the ninth in a series of eleven, showing the dying man protected from despair by visions of the crucifixion, Mary Magdalene, and Saint Peter. Other illustrations from the same series depict demons clamoring for control of the man’s soul.
Like this one, most block books were religious and didactic in nature. The popular Danse Macabre image cycle, which depicts death taking people from different ranks of life, appeared frequently in manuscripts and artwork and also became a block book. The Apoclyapse of John was adapted as a block book, as was the entire Bible, compressed into about 40 engraved pages known as the Biblia Pauperum, or the Poor Man’s Bible. The only block book without images was a version of the popular Latin grammar of Donatus.
What was the audience for books of this nature? Block books were ephemeral items and few have survived, so we have less evidence for their use than we do for other types of texts. But it’s reasonable to assume that the were produced for a popular audience, and the centrality of images over text indicates that they would have been accessible even to those with low literacy skills. They certainly had religious and educational intentions, but it’s likely that people also enjoyed the vivid images for their own sake, and the leaves could conceivably have been separated and displayed.
Block books were produced in significant quantities for only a few decades, with most printed in northern Europe during the 1460s. Their numbers diminished significantly in the latter decades of the century, replaced by growing numbers of books, pamphlets and broadsides that combined movable type with woodcuts. Blockbooks had a short lifespan, but they are important as an indicator of the period’s demand for texts. Far from the stereotypical image of ignorant dark age peasants, medieval laypeople were interested in using and owning books for the same reasons that we are – for education, entertainment, and as marks of social status. Blockbooks were a way that the middle and lower classes could participate in the expansion of book culture during the period when printed texts were still largely out of their reach.
by Laura Massey on May 22, 2010
Utopia by Thomas More 1516
Some days in a rare book shop are definitely more exciting than others. For instance, last week I had the privilege of cataloguing the first edition of Thomas More’s Utopia, recently purchased at auction by Peter Harrington for a customer. This copy is bound in late-18th-century sheepskin with a red morocco label to the spine, as you can see below. In the photo above the book is open to the map of Utopia and a table of the island’s alphabet.
A truly rare book, OCLC lists only 18 institutional copies. While no comprehensive census of private copies has been undertaken, only seven have appeared at auction during the last thirty-five years, so it is reasonable to estimate that 10-15 copies are in private libraries.
Morocco Spine Label
Thomas More by Hans Holbein 1527
Born in London in 1478, Thomas More embodied many of the dichotomies of the late Middle Ages. His family built its wealth through trade before joining the ruling elite (his grandfathers were a baker and a chandler, while his father was a barrister and judge), and even while walking the corridors of power More would express pride in his family’s humble origins. Showing intelligence at an early age he was schooled for a secular legal career, but was also interested in religion and the humanist movement. It was his intellectual engagement with these contradictory spheres that would make More a towering figure in Renaissance thought.
As a young man More struggled to reconcile secular governance with the demands of Christianity. By his early thirties he was writing histories and epigrams that celebrated royal power but also betrayed “a profound sense of unease with the corruption often associated with kingship” (ODNB). These concerns were given their full expression in Utopia, an imaginative satire written just as he was embarking on a career in the English royal court.
The publication of Utopia is an excellent demonstration of the tightly-knit network of intellectuals and publishers that crossed Europe during the Renaissance. The book was inspired by a 1515 trip to Antwerp, where More visited Erasmus’s friend, the scholar Peter Gilles. Once More had returned to England the three men maintained a correspondence on the text, collaboratively editing and titling it, while Gilles created the Utopian alphabet. In November 1516 the manuscript was entrusted to another friend of Erasmus, the prominent printer Thierry Martin, whose device appears in the colophon (below). In mid-December More wrote to Erasmus, calling the book “ours” and saying that he waited on its completion just as a mother would the return of her son from abroad. The first copies appeared in early January 1517.
Printer's Device of Thierry Martens
Utopia became an immediate success and quickly went through several editions, but it was a challenging and widely misunderstood book. Using irony and complex wordplay it criticized the flaws and injustices of contemporary states while offering solutions for modern leaders. The fictional island of Utopia, from the Greek for “nowhere”, demonstrated some of the traits of an ideal state such as wisdom and tolerance (though it was never meant to depict a perfect nation). Additionally, the book was a reaction to the rapid change engendered by the Renaissance, with More arguing that the carefully considered reform of existing social and legal systems was far preferable to their wholesale overthrow.
Most significantly, Utopia is More’s reconciliation of Christian morality and humanist idealism with the messy business of governance. Because rulers could not be trusted to act justly of their own accord, it was necessary for principled advisers to subtly guide them. As the character Morus puts it:
… there is another philosophy, more practical for statesmen, which knows its stage, adapts itself to the play at hand, and performs its role neatly and appropriately … If you cannot pluck up wrongheaded opinions by the root, if you cannot cure according to your heart’s desire vices of long standing, yet you must not on that account desert the commonwealth. You must not abandon the ship in a storm because you cannot control the winds.
For 20 years More successfully balanced these conflicting prerogatives. He rose to the post of Lord Chancellor, only to fall from favor and face execution in 1535 after taking a moral stand against Henry VIII’s divorce and usurpation of Papal authority. More’s public life and death demonstrated his commitment to the ideals he had espoused in Utopia, and it remains his most influential and popular work, inspiring later thinkers such as Samuel Johnson, Voltaire, and Jonathan Swift. In its grappling with issues of morality, justice, and power it is as relevant today as when it was first published.
Utopia
by Laura Massey on May 17, 2010
Marching As To War is our fifth e-catalogue, comprising 90 items on warfare throughout history. Below is a small selection—you can view the full catalogue online or download it as a .pdf.
VILLARI, Luigi. Fire and Sword in the Caucasus. London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1906 [50665]
Octavo. Original red pictorial cloth, title gilt to spine and upper board with “asiatic” silhouette skyline to both, top edge gilt, others uncut. Frontispiece and 63 other plates from photographs by the author. A touch sunned on the spine, light marginal foxing, but overall a very nice copy. £375
First and only edition.
OAKESHOTT, Ronald Ewart. The Archaeology of Weapons. Arms and Armor from Prehistory to the Age of Chivalry. Frederick A. Praeger, New York, 1960 [36932]
Octavo. 360pp. Frontispiece and 22 other plates, line-drawn illustrations to the text, maps to the endpapers. Very good in the original red and black cloth in slightly rubbed dust jacket, a little split on the fold of the front turn-in. £65
First US edition, same year as the first UK.
MILLARD, Oscar E. Uncensored. The True Story of the Clandestine Newspaper “La Libre Belgique” published in Brussels during the German Occupation. London, Robert Hale and Company, [1937] [47718]
Octavo, original orange cloth, title gilt to spine, orange top-stain. In the dust jacket. Portrait frontispiece and 15 other plates. Light toning, else very good in slightly rubbed and soiled jacket, a couple of chips at the top edge, some pencil annotations, but pictorially and textually complete. £150
First edition. A far from uncommon book, but genuinely scarce in the extremely stylish Leslie Holland jacket.
GUEVARA, [Ernesto] “Che”. Guerrilla warfare. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1961 [49347]
Octavo. Original grey cloth, title in black to spine. In the dust jacket. A very sharp copy in a slightly toned, unclipped, jacket. £85
First edition in English. Excellent copy of this influential text.
SASSOON, Siegfried. Memoirs of an Infantry Officer. By the Author of Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man. Fourth Impression. London, Faber & Faber Limited, 1930 [47755]
Octavo, original mid-blue cloth, title gilt to spine. In the dust jacket. Cloth a little mottled, some light foxing particularly to the endpapers, else very good in a pictorial jacket, a little rubbed, a touch sunned at the spine and with a couple of minor blemishes, but complete and visually striking. £675
First edition, fourth impression, a month after the first.
VIRILIO, Paul. Bunker Archéologie. Paris: Centre de Création Industrielle, Centre Georges Pompidou, 1975 [52135]
Small square quarto. Original stiff card wraps with wide French-fold turn-ins. Profusely illustrated from Virilio‟s photographs Wraps very slightly yellowed at the edges, and just a touch chafed, particularly on the spine edges, but overall a very good copy. £400
First edition. Catalogue for the Exhibition of Virilio’s photographic studies of the bunkers around the Western and Northern coasts of France.
(FIRST WORLD WAR) Halt! Who goes there? London: Published by the Parliamentary Recruiting Committee… Poster No. 60. Printed by Hill, Siffken & Co. (L.P.A. Ltd.), Grafton Works, 1915 [50334]
Three colour lithographic recruiting poster ( 1000 × 615 mm) Striking image of a sentry with bayonet fixed, silhouetted against a yellow sky streaked with grey clouds, figure and background in maroon, text in bold white letters. Light creases from old folds, some mild off-setting from where folded, but overall very good indeed. £300
Extremely well-preserved example.
by Laura Massey on May 8, 2010
As bibliophiles, how often do we stop to consider the ways sightless people experience books and reading? Prior to the mid-nineteenth century few options existed for the blind; several systems of raised lettering had been developed, but they were complicated and difficult to learn. Meanwhile, the growth of literacy and the media during the industrial revolution led to an increased demand for texts of all types, including those accessible to the blind.
William Moon, born in 1818, contracted smallpox as a young child and by age 22 had lost his sight completely, which ended his dream of entering Holy Orders. Frustrated by the quality of the embossed reading systems he tried, and eager to improve worldwide literacy and access to the Bible, he set about developing his own system based on roman lettering. Moon’s system was easy to master, particularly for those who had learned to read before they lost their sight, and it became very successful. Below is an example of the word ‘book’ in Moon script demonstrating how close the letters are to the roman forms.
Demand for these materials was high, and Moon began printing a monthly magazine and other booklets. He also traveled extensively, setting up presses and teaching others to use his system. His great ambition, however, was to print the entire Bible. Hindered by a lack of type, he experimented with stereotyping. Financial assistance was provided by the philanthropist Sir Charles Lowther, who had also been blinded in childhood and whose mother had imported some of the first embossed books into England. Moon soon learned to produce stereotyped plates at a sixth of the normal price and in 1848 began printing chapters of the Bible–it would total 60 volumes in all, each one loosely bound with a guide on the cover.
Engraving of a man and child reading Moon script.
X, Y, and Z, from the tutorial.
Below, the back of the embossed pages:
The attributes that made Moon’s books successful also made them impractical, as they utilized large letters that could only be printed on heavy paper on single-sided pages. This copy of part I of the Gospel of Matthew measures 378 × 273 mm and is 40 mm thick, far larger than the same amount of printed text. The size of the books made them impractical to store and the loose binding meant that copies deteriorated quickly. This intact volume, stereotyped by Moon himself in 1848 with a cover dated to 1859, is a rare specimen.
The introduction of Braille in 1870 marked the beginning of the end for Moon’s script, but recent technology has solved the problem of its unwieldiness and lead to renewed interest in the system, particularly for individuals who have lost their sight after learning to read and those who have difficulty reading Braille. You can read more about the Moon system at the website of the Royal National Institute for the Blind and the William Moon website.
