Illustrated books -- Bibliography; Illustration of books; Printing -- History
Fine della prima Cantica appellata Inferno della Commedia di Dante
poeta eccellentissimo. Impressa nella Stamperia Privata di Ashendene a
Shelley House, Chelsea, per opera e spesa di St. John & Cicely Hornby
coll' aiuto del loro cugino Meysey Turton. Le lettere iniziali sono
l'opera di Graily Hewitt, le incisioni in legno di C. Keates secondo
disegni fatti da R. Catterson Smith sopra gli originali dell' edizione
di 1491. Finita nel mese di Dicembre dell' anno del Signore MCMII, nel
quale dopo dieci secoli di bellezza cadde il gran Campanile di San
Marco dei Veneziani.
The third type happily inspired by the example of Morris was the Greek
type designed by Robert Proctor on the model of that used for the New
Testament of the Complutensian Polyglott in 1514, with the addition of
majuscules and accents, both of them lacking in the original. An edition
of the _Oresteia_ of Aeschylus in this type was being printed for Mr.
Proctor at the Chiswick Press at the time of his death, and appeared in
1904. In 1908 it was followed by an edition of the _Odyssey_ printed at
the Clarendon Press. Like Morris's gothic founts, this Greek type may or
may not be admired, but that it attains the effects at which it aims can
hardly be denied. No page of such richness had ever before been set up
by any printer of Greek.
To write of books printed in types which for one reason or another seem
less successful than those already named is a less grateful task, but
there are several designers and printers whose work approaches
excellence, and who worked independently of Morris, though with less
sure touch. Foremost among these must be placed Mr. Charles
Ricketts,[70] whose Vale type, despite a few blemishes, is not very far
behind the Golden type of the Kelmscott Press, and whose ornament at its
best is graceful, and that with a lighter and gayer grace than Morris's,
though it cannot compare with his for dignity or richness of effect. In
a later type, called the Kinge's Fount from its use in an edition of
_The Kinges Quair_ (1903), Mr. Ricketts's good genius deserted him, for
the mixture of majuscule and minuscule forms is most unpleasing.
The Eragny books printed by Esther and Lucien Pissarro on their press at
Epping, Bedford Park, and the Brook, Chiswick, were at first (1894-1903,
Nos. 1-16) printed by Mr. Ricketts's permission in the Vale type. In
June, 1903, a "Brook" fount designed by Mr. Pissarro was completed, and
_A Brief Account of the Origin of the Eragny Press_ printed in it. Mr.
Pissarro's books are chiefly notable for their woodcuts, which are of
very varying merit.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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