Books On Books

Alan Kitching: A Life in Letterpress

Alan Kitching: A Life in Letterpress

$70.00
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Designed by Simon Esterson of Esterson Associates, this long-awaited monograph documents the work of world-renowned typographer, designer and letterpress practitioner Alan Kitching.

Spanning over fifty years, this lavish volume leads us from Kitching's first typographical experiments under the auspices of mentor Anthony Froshaug to his most iconic creations at The Typography Workshop. It covers his years designing alongside Derek Birdsall, as well as his time teaching letterpress at the Royal College of Art, and showcases his most colourful and expressive pieces, including his prolific work for The Guardian. Kitching's work hangs in private collections and galleries but it has also featured on everything from magazine and book covers, postage stamps and theatre posters, to wine labels, billboards and signage.

Designed by Simon Esterson of Esterson Associates, this long-awaited monograph documents the work of world-renowned typographer, designer and letterpress practitioner Alan Kitching.

Spanning over fifty years, this lavish volume leads us from Kitching's first typographical experiments under the auspices of mentor Anthony Froshaug to his most iconic creations at The Typography Workshop. It covers his years designing alongside Derek Birdsall, as well as his time teaching letterpress at the Royal College of Art, and showcases his most colourful and expressive pieces, including his prolific work for The Guardian. Kitching's work hangs in private collections and galleries but it has also featured on everything from magazine and book covers, postage stamps and theatre posters, to wine labels, billboards and signage.

Alexander Strahan, Victorian Publisher (USED)

Alexander Strahan, Victorian Publisher (USED)

$15.00
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University of Michigan Press. VG/VG

Anatomy of Printing: The Influences of Art and History on Its Design (USED)

Anatomy of Printing: The Influences of Art and History on Its Design

$65.00
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Black cloth with gilt decoration and lettering; both dj and book in near fine condition. VG/VG

Cross of Snow: A Life of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Cross of Snow: A Life of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

$37.50
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A major literary biography of America's best-loved nineteenth-century poet, the first in more than fifty years, and a much-needed reassessment for the twenty-first century of a writer whose stature and celebrity were unparalleled in his time, whose work helped to explain America's new world not only to Americans but to Europe and beyond. From the author of On Paper (Buoyant--The New Yorker; Essential--Publishers Weekly), Patience and Fortitude (A wonderful hymn--Simon Winchester), and A Gentle Madness (A jewel--David McCullough).

In Cross of Snow, the result of more than twelve years of research, including access to never-before-examined letters, diaries, journals, notes, Nicholas Basbanes reveals the life, the times, the work--the soul--of the man who shaped the literature of a new nation with his countless poems, sonnets, stories, essays, translations, and whose renown was so wide-reaching that his deep friendships included Charles Dickens, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Julia Ward Howe, and Oscar Wilde.

Basbanes writes of the shaping of Longfellow's character, his huge body of work that included translations of numerous foreign works, among them, the first rendering into a complete edition by an American of Dante's Divine Comedy. We see Longfellow's two marriages, both happy and contented, each cut short by tragedy. His first to Mary Storer Potter that ended in the aftermath of a miscarriage, leaving Longfellow devastated. His second marriage to the brilliant Boston socialite--Fanny Appleton, after a three-year pursuit by Longfellow (his fiery crucible, he called it), and his emergence as a literary force and a man of letters.

A portrait of a bold artist, experimenter of poetic form and an innovative translator--the human being that he was, the times in which he lived, the people whose lives he touched, his monumental work and its place in his America and ours.


Emperor  of  Dreams:  A  Clark  Ashton  Smith  Bibliography

Emperor of Dreams: A Clark Ashton Smith Bibliography

$48.00
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Donald M. Grant, Publisher, 1978. 1st edition; dust jacket protected; edges toned; light brown cloth; front hinge has small crack in top corner; text clean. G/G

Fifty Forgotten Books

Fifty Forgotten Books

$19.95
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Fifty Forgotten Books is a very special sort of book about books, by a great bookman and for book-people of all ages and levels of experience. Not quite literary criticism, not quite an autobiography, it is at once a guided tour through the dusty backrooms of long vanished used bookstores, a love letter to bookshops and bookselling, and a browser's dream wish list of often overlooked and unloved novels, short story collections, poetry collections and works of nonfiction.

In these pages, R. B. Russell, publisher of Tartarus Press, doesn't only discuss the books of his life, but explains what they have meant to him over time, charting his progress as a writer and publisher for over thirty years . . . and a bibliophile for many more. Here is living proof of how literature, books, and book collecting can be an intrinsic part of one's personal, professional and imaginative life, and as not only a solitary act, but a social one, resulting in treasured friendships, experiences, and loves one might never, otherwise, have enjoyed.

Filled with a lively nostalgia for the era when finding strange new books meant pounding the pavement and not just filling in search engines, Fifty Forgotten Books is for anyone who wishes they could still browse the dusty bookshelves of their youth, and who can't wait to get back out into the world in quest of the next text liable to change their life.

Fleuron Anthology (USED)

Fleuron Anthology (USED)

$30.00
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Chosen and with a retrospectus by Sir Francis Meynell & Herbert Simon. Spine and edges toned; spine creased; binding good; text clean. VG

Indecent Pleasures: The Life and Colorful Times of William Targ (USED)

Indecent Pleasures: The Life and Colorful Times of William Targ (USED)

$18.00
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Dust jacket in protective cover; minimal wear to dj; black cloth spine over beige cloth; binding good; text clean. VG/VG

The Making of a Book at the Officina Bodoni: Twelve Woodcuts by Frans Masereel (USED)
The Making of a Book at the Officina Bodoni: Twelve Woodcuts by Frans Masereel (USED)
The Making of a Book at the Officina Bodoni: Twelve Woodcuts by Frans Masereel (USED)
The Making of a Book at the Officina Bodoni: Twelve Woodcuts by Frans Masereel (USED)
The Making of a Book at the Officina Bodoni: Twelve Woodcuts by Frans Masereel (USED)

Making of a Book at the Officina Bodoni: Twelve Woodcuts by Frans Masereel

$295.00
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Two-page introduction followed by 12 full page woodcuts. Mardersteig's commentary is printed on each facing page. One leaf of contents. One of 300 copies printed at the Officina Bodoni. Masereel's woodcuts (which first appeared in the 1929 "Operation of a Hand Press") are printed from the original woodblocks.

Verona: Officina Bodoni, 1973.Scarce and near fine.

Printing  Poetry:  A  Workbook  in  Typographic  Reification
Printing  Poetry:  A  Workbook  in  Typographic  Reification
Printing  Poetry:  A  Workbook  in  Typographic  Reification

Printing Poetry: A Workbook in Typographic Reification

$195.00
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San Francisco: Scarab Press, 1980. Limited to 2000 copies; dust jacket in protective cover; spine toned; small tears at top edge and bottom front corner; blue cloth spine over illustrated paper boards; corners bumped; 1 folded page announcement for book laid in front; binding tight; text clean and bright. VG/G