Pictured below is a volume of plays and poetry by Oliver Goldsmith. It is bound in seal leather, which, I suppose, accounts for the extremely soft and “puffy” feel.
I like leather-bound books, when I can find them, and the Franklin Library and Easton Press have obliged by publishing classic works of literature and history between leather-covered boards, on acid-free paper, with gilt-edged pages. Unfortunately, the designs can run to the fairly gaudy. Here are a couple: the first is The Pilgrim’s Progress, and the second is The Brothers Karamazov. Elegant or over the top? You be the judge.
The Limited Editions Club also published deluxe editions, and, if anything, went even crazier with materials and design. When I saw this one, the first thing that occurred to me was that it must be a recipe book. But no, it is, in fact, On Conciliation with the Colonies, and Other Papers on the American Revolution, by Edmund Burke. A close look at the design reveals it to be something in the American colonial mode.
Is the Bros. Karamazov an extra-wide edition, possibly annotated? or is that a camera effect? I like that one.
ReplyDeletePilgrim's Progress looks like a Koran or something. Too busy.
It's a big edition, with double columns on each page. There's probably enough gold on it to make a $50 American buffalo.
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