FABLES

London & New York: William Heinemann & Doubleday, Page, 1912. No. 863 of 1,450 SIGNED by Rackham. With an Introduction by G. K. Chesterton. 290 x 227 mm. (11 1/2 x 9"). xxix, [1], 223, [1] pp.
SUPERB HONEY-BROWN CRUSHED MOROCCO, GILT AND INLAID, BY SANGORSKI & SUTCLIFFE (stamp-signed on front turn-in), covers with Arts & Crafts-style frame of gilt rules punctuated with inlaid green morocco dots, inlaid green morocco Tudor roses at corners with four leafy branches, upper cover with gilt titling at head of central panel, central gilt-ruled medallion contain the letters "E B" in inlaid blue and green morocco with a collar lettered "XMAS 1912," this surrounded by a wreath of gilt vines and eight inlaid green morocco roses, raised bands, spine compartments with French fillet frames, two panels with gilt lettering, turn-ins with multiple gilt rules, top edge gilt, other edges untrimmed. Housed in a felt-lined buckram clamshell box. With 20 full-page black and white illustrations, numerous illustrations in the text, and 13 COLOR PLATES, as called for, each mounted on heavy brown stock and protected by lettered tissue guard. Printed on Large Paper. WITH HAND-ILLUMINATED PRESENTATION LEAF BOUND IN: "TO EDMUND" written in burnished gold, surrounded by curling leafy vines in blue, orange, and green, "WITH BEST WISHES FOR A MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR" written in black ink, an ornament below it in colors and gold, and "FROM THE BINDERY / XMAS. 1912." in black and red ink at foot. Front pastedown with engraved bookplate of "EMB" and "EWB"; front free endpaper with ex-libris of L. W. Jordan Jr. and with pencilled inscription "To Roxy from Edmund." Hudson, p. 169; Latimore and Haskell, pp. 38-39. The typical offsetting on free endpapers from binder's glue used for turn-ins, very small, very faint areas of transfer from acidic mounts used for color plates (wherever tissue guard doesn't fully cover a facing leaf), other trivial imperfections, but still QUITE A LOVELY COPY, clean and fresh internally, and in an unworn handsome binding.

In a fine binding by an eminent English workshop, this is Rackham's take on the famous fables, populated with charming animals anthropomorphized to just the right degree, along with wistful maidens, ancient crones, and some seriously sinister trees. Arthur Rackham (1867-1939) studied art at Lambeth School, where the work of his fellow student Charles Ricketts influenced his development. As Houfe says, soon after Rackham joined the staff of "The Westminster Budget" in 1892, he began concentrating "on the illustration of books and particularly those of a mystical, magic, or legendary background. He very soon established himself as one of the foremost Edwardian illustrators and was triumphant in the early 1900s when color printing first enabled him to use subtle tints and muted tones to represent age and timelessness. Rackham's imaginative eye saw all forms with the eyes of childhood and created a world that was half reassuring and half frightening. His sources were primarily Victorian, and among them are evidently the works of Cruikshank, Doyle, Houghton, and Beardsley, but also the prints of Dürer and Altdorfer." After studying under, and then working for, Douglas Cockerell, Francis Sangorski and George Sutcliffe founded their own bindery in 1901 and continued in a successful partnership until 1912. During that year, the firm suffered three major blows: their famously splendid jewelled binding, dubbed the "Great Omar," was lost on the Titanic; a few weeks after this accident, Francis himself drowned; and Francis' brother, Alberto, who had been a central figure in producing the firm's vellum illuminated manuscripts, went over to Riviere. Despite these losses, the firm grew and prospered, employing a staff of 80 by the mid-1920s and becoming perhaps the most successful English bindery of the 20th century. This special binding was created as a Christmas present, and includes a hand-illuminated leaf from the bindery, possibly done by Alberto before he moved to Riviere. Such a grand presentation could only have been reserved for a special patron, and in this case, the "Edmund" would have been Edmund DeWitt Brooks (1866-1919), the substantial bookseller and bibliophile from Minneapolis. The present volume stands as a monument to a very close friendship between Brooks as well as his wife and namesake son on one side of the Atlantic and Sangorski & Sutcliffe on the other. With a special interest in literary works, particularly in fine bindings, Brooks came to know his supplier through annual book-buying trips abroad (see Lee Edmonds Grove's 1945 memoir "Of Brooks & Books" for an account of that relationship). Grove says that the nature of the friendship was so strong that the binders invited Brooks to stay in a specially outfitted room at their premises, rather than in a hotel, during his London visits. Although our Aesop was inscribed to the father, his son (Edmund William Brooks, 1900-85), so 12 at the time the present volume was signed, continued the family connection with Sangorski & Sutcliffe for many years. The "EMB" and "EWB" bookplates belonged to Edmund's wife Edith M. Brooks (1862-1957) and son Edmund who apparently lived together in the family home after the elder Edmund died. Although we don't know the identity of "Roxy," we do know that the "To Roxy from Edmund" inscription is in the same hand as an identical one made--surely by our younger Edmund as printer/publisher--at the front of a copy of "The Book of Ruth," issued in 1934 by the Reed Pale Press (that copy being offered for sale in 2022 by Under the Hill Books)..