Five Rare Books for Collectors: Private Press & Illustrated Books

Highlights from Blackwell's Rare Books' latest catalogue Private Press & Illustrated Books include:

* Shaw Gives Himself Away, an Autobiographical Miscellany, by George Bernard Shaw, Newtown, Powys: Gregynog Press, 1939. First edition, from an edition of 300 copies, printed on Arnold green-tinted handmade paper, wood engraved portrait frontispiece of Shaw by John Farleigh, original binding by Paul Nash, darkest green oasis morocco with abstract designs based upon GBS’s initials. The book contains a number of extracts and other short pieces, nearly all of which have some degree of revision by Shaw, for this edition.

* Dear Edward. Being the Correspondence, 1968-1989, by Edward Bawden & Peyton Skipwith, with a foreword by David Gentleman. Hand & Eye Editions, 2017, first edition from an edition of 325 copies, printed on Mohawk
Superfine paper, decorations printed in blue and brown, 2 tipped-in facsimile letters, numerous illustrations by Bawden, including many full-page.  A correspondence that began via Skipwith’s role at the Fine Art Society,
and including a few letters from other people at that institution; the correspondence has a professional context, but with a personal touch that speaks of a friendship that extends beyond business matters.

* Motifs of Ancient Civilizations, Alsager: Cheshire County Training College, [1964,] lino-cut decoration to title-page and 10 lino-cuts printed direct from the block in different colours, marbled endpapers. An unrecorded and impressive example of school-printing at a mid-twentieth century college – at Alsager, near Stoke-on Trent and the border
with Staffordshire. Beyond the prelims the work is entirely visual and very attractively so. No other examples of printing from the college could be traced, and no names are attached to the work here – which includes examples from China, Persia, India, Greece, Japan, Egypt, and New Guinea.