C-S, THE MASTER CRAFTSMAN

Harper Woods, Michigan: [Printed by Leonard F. Bahr at] The Adagio Press, 1969. ONE OF 12 COPIES WITH TWO ORIGINAL LEAVES PRINTED ON VELLUM (and, of these, one of 10 with a gilt initial) from a total edition of 329 copies. SIGNED BY THE PRINTER. 390 x 255 mm. (15 1/2 x 10"). 49, [1] pp., [3] leaves (last blank).
Publisher's vellum-backed marbled paper boards, gilt titling on spine. Mounted photo of Emery Walker and Cobden-Sanderson laid in at front. Text printed in sanguine, blue, and black. Tidcombe, pp. ix, 144, 154; Cave, p. 264. ◆In mint condition.

This handsomely printed book is a study of Thomas James Cobden-Sanderson (1840-1922), founder of the Doves Press and the foremost figure in the late 19th and early 20th century among those who straddled the fields of English fine press publishing and artistic binding. The first section, by Norman H. Strouse, gives an overview of the life, character, and aims of Cobden-Sanderson. The second section, by John Dreyfus, studies the troubled relationship of Cobden-Sanderson with his original partner in the press, Emery Walker, based on the discovery of new documents. Our copy of this study includes two leaves from Doves Press books, one from Goethe's "Iphigenie auf Tauris" and the other from the English Bible, the former with a fine burnished gold manuscript initial by Edward Johnston. The published copies are divided among 242 regular copies with two leaves on paper, 75 copies with a Bible leaf on paper and a different leaf on vellum, and the other 12 with two vellum leaves (10 of those with the gold Johnston initial). While copies with one or two leaves on paper are readily available, those copies like the present example--with two gilt-decorated vellum leaves--are very hard to come by. Cave calls our work an "important study" and "the most substantial" product of the Adagio Press, which was founded in 1956 in Grosse Pointe Park, Michigan, by Leonard F. Bahr and later moved to Harper Woods, Michigan..