Being the Exile and Death of the Sons of Usnech

[Republic of Ireland]: The Dolman Press, 1954. Limited Edition. Hardcover. Near fine. Cranwill, Mia. One of 225 copies, octavo size, 40 pp. This story "Being the Exile and Death of the Sons of Usnech", a portion of the "Book of Leinster", an Irish manuscript compiled in the middle of the twelfth century. The work translated by Thomas Kinsella (1928-2021), a university professor and poet whose first work was published by The Dolman Press, founded in 1951 specifically to publish Irish poetry, including works by Yeats.

The illustrations by Mia Cranwill (1880-1972), "one of the leading artists of the Irish Celtic Revival." She created numerous pieces of metalwork, most of original design, many pieces for high churchmen; George Bernard Shaw referred to her as "the Irish Benvenuto Cellini" (n.b., quotes from Wiki).

A scarce publication, as of this writing we see only one other copy in the online marketplace; our search of OCLC finds no copies, as does our seach of the British Library online (which, as of this writing, is still experiencing problems from the cyberattack).

___DESCRIPTION: Bound in decorated tan paper (the decoration based on the illustration found on p. 18) over boards, parchment shelfback with brown lettering, frontis and two other full-page black-and-white illustrations bound in throughout with an additional six smaller illustrations (chapter headpieces and in-text), illustrated title page, each section opens with a three-line red initial capital; octavo size (8 7/8" by 5 3/4"), pagination: [1-8] 9-32 [33-40], limited edition of 225 copies, this being no. 224.

___CONDITION: Near fine, with clean boards, straight corners without rubbing, a strong, square text block with solid hinges, the interior is clean and bright, and entirely free of prior owner markings; some light rubbing to the decorated front board, light dustiness to the parchment shelfback, and very light toning to the endpapers; altogether a lovely copy.

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