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Tag Archives: Wales

Book of the Week — Wrenching Times: Poems from Drum-Taps

15 Sunday Apr 2018

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Abraham Lincoln, Alan Wood, assassination, Brooklyn, Capitol, David Esslemont, democratic, frontier, Gaylord Schanilec, Gwasg Gregynog, Hugh Willmer, lilacs, M. Wynn Thomas, memorial, Monotype Baskerville, New York, Newton, North Wales Arts Association, poet, Powys, President, rare books, Rhian Ticehurst, typeface, Union, Wales, Walt Whitman, Washington, Western, wood blocks, wood engravings, Zerkall mould-made paper

PS3211-A3-1991-Portrait

“When lilacs last in the door-yard bloom’d,
And the great star early droop’d in the western sky in the night,
I mourn’d…and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.”

Wrenching Times: Poems from Drum-Taps
Walt Whitman (1819-1892)
Newton, Powys, Wales: Gwasg Gregynog, 1991
PS3211 A3 1991

From notes by M. Wynn Thomas: “Whitman was in New York, seeing Drum-Taps through the press, when Lincoln was assassinated on the evening of 14 April 1865, at the very time when he had finally secured victory for the Union. Whitman had come to identify very closely with the president, having supported him when others dismissed him as a mere country hick, and having seen him pass every day under Whitman’s window in Washington on his journey to and from the Capitol. Lincoln was, for the poet, the very epitome of Western, frontier qualities and his steadfast adherence, through the worst of times, to his principled belief in a democratic Union had won Whitman’s unqualified and undying admiration. Years later, in his old age, he would still endeavour, whenever his health allowed, to deliver an annual memorial lecture on the day of Lincoln’s death. On that occasion he always ensured that lilacs were placed on the table in front of him.

“The lilac was in flower near his Brooklyn home when Whitman heard of Lincoln’s murder.”

PS3211-A3-1991-Locomotive

Wood engravings by Gaylord Schanilec, made at Gregynog during a residency, supported by the North Wales Arts Association, and printed from the original wood-blocks. Designed and printed by David Esslemont with the assistance of Hugh Willmer on Zerkall mould-made paper. Typeface is Monotype Baskerville. Edition of four hundred and fifty copies, one of four hundred copies bound in quarter leather by Alan Wood and Rhian Ticehurst at Gregynog.

Gregynog Press was a Welsh private press, started and run by two wealthy sisters, whose interests were more artistic than literary. All of the work of the books from this press happened under one roof – design layout, composition, presswork, design and execution of woodblocks, hand-coloring and binding – an unusual circumstance for early twentieth century presses.

Rare Books copy is number 201 with unpublished wood engraving laid in.

PS3211-A3-1991-Horse

April is National Poetry Month.

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Book of the Week — Cilantro, sage, rosemary and thyme

10 Monday Apr 2017

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Africa, America, Asia, barrister, C. J. Phipps, California, Capul, Cavendish, Columbian Encounter, Comte de Buffon, Daines Barrington, Don Francisco Antonio Mourelle, English, Europe, French, Georges-Louis Leclerc, Greenland, Labrador, London, Lord Mulgrave, Magna Carta, Manilla, Mozart, natural history, naturalist, New Guinea, New World, Nichols, potatotes, Schouten, science, Spanish, tobacco, Turkey, Wales, White

AC7-B34-1781-Map
“What we saw of the country leaves us no doubt of its fertility, and that it is capable of producing all the plants of Europe. In most of the gullies of the hills there are rills of clear and cool water, the sides of which are covered with herbs (as in the meadows of Europe) of both agreeable verdure and smell. Amongst these were Castilian roses, smallage, lilies, plantain, thistles, camomile, and many others. We likewise found strawberries, rasberries, blackberries, sweet onions, and potatoes, all which grew in considerable abundance, and particularly near the rills. Amongst other plants we observed one which much resembled percely (though not in its smell), which the Indians bruised and eat, after mixing it with onions.”
— Daines Barrington translating Don Francisco Antonio Mourelle’s Journal of a Voyage, in 1775, to Explore the Coast of America, northward of California

Miscellanies
Daines Barrington (1727-1800)
London: Printed by J. Nichols, sold by B. White, 1781
First edition
AC7 B34 1781

Daines Barrington was an English barrister and naturalist. After filling various posts, he was appointed a judge in 1757, in Wales. He was noted for his observations on the Statutes, chiefly the more ancient, from Magna Carta to 21st James I (1766). Many of Barrington’s writings were published by the Royal and Antiquarian Societies, of which he was a member. Some of these papers were collected by Barrington in this volume.

Miscellanies contains the first publication of Don Francisco Antonio Mourelle’s Journal of a Voyage, in 1775, to Explore the Coast of America, Northward of California… translated from a Spanish manuscript. This is the only contemporary source in English of the voyage exploring the northwest coast of America.

Also in this volume is “The Probability of Reaching the North Pole” (1775), a tract reporting on the results of the northern voyage of discovery undertaken by Captain C. J. Phipps, who later became Lord Mulgrave. The report discussed the floating ice found in high northern and southern latitudes. For this and other reasons, it was especially helpful to whaling captains who frequented the coasts of Greenland and Labrador.

Included in Miscellanies is a biography of Mozart, various essays on natural history, and a discussion on whether the turkey was known in Europe before the Columbian Encounter. Barrington concluded that it was, as were tobacco and potatoes, contradicting the great French naturalist and encyclopedist Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (1707-1788).

“If M. de Buffon had not thus excluded Asia and Africa, the controversy would have turned out, as if the point to be discussed was, whether tobacco and potatoes were not peculiar to the New World. Now it is certan that both these plants are of American growth, but not exclusively so, for in 1584, Cavendish received potatoes from the inhabitants of Capul, which is an island not far from Manilla; and in 1616, Schouten was supplied with tobacco from the coast of New Guiney.”

Science was and is as political as war — England was at war with France during this time. And it never occurred to either de Buffon or Barrington that indigenous peoples might have crossed oceans long before the Europeans did.

AC7-B34-1781-Plate

AC7-B34-1781-title

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Book of the Week — Lexicon Tetraglotton…

10 Monday Oct 2016

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alchemy, alphabet, anatomist, anatomy, architecture, Aristotle, Ben Jonson, Benjamin Franklin, cats, Charles, chemistry, clothing, dictionary, England, English, engraver, engraving, Europe, France, French, frontispiece, history, horsemanship, hunting, Italian, Italy, James Howell, Kenelm Digby, Kings, lexicography, lexicon, library, London, Machiavelli, Oxford, physician, political, Poor Richard's Almanac, proverbs, reference, Restoration, Samuel Thompson, Spain, Spanish, tracts, travel, trees, Wales, William Faithorne, William Harvey, women

lexicon-tetraglotton-frontis

lexicon-tetraglotton-title

“A catt may look on a king”

Lexicon Tetraglotton, an English-French-Italian-Spanish…
James Howell (1594? – 1666)
London: Printed by J.G. for Samuel Thompson, 1660
First and only edition

James Howell, born in Wales and educated at Oxford, began his literary career in 1640 with the political allegory, Dendrologia: Dodona’s Grove, or, The Vocall Forest, an account representing the history of England and Europe through the framework of a typology of trees. He continued to write political tracts throughout the 1640s and 1650s, drawing material from Aristotle, Machiavelli, and others. Howell befriended many literary figures, including Ben Jonson and Kenelm Digby. In 1620, he became ill and was treated by physician and anatomist William Harvey.

Howell wrote Instructions for Forreine Travel in 1642, a book of useful information about safe travel in France, Spain, and Italy. Traveling in his own country proved to be hazardous, however. On a visit to London early in 1643, he was arrested in his chambers and imprisoned for the next eight years. He spent this time writing. He was released from prison at the Restoration of Charles to the throne and in 1661 was made Historiographer Royal.

Howell was a master of modern romance languages. Lexicon is a dictionary but also contains epistles and poems on lexicography; characterizations of most letters of the alphabet; and vocabulary lists organized in 52 sections, such as anatomy, chemistry, alchemy, women’s clothing, horsemanship, hunting, architecture, and a library. Howell collected proverbs in English, Italian, Spanish and French which are added in Proverbs, or, Old Sayed Savves & Adages. Benjamin Franklin used this book as a reference for his own Poor Richard’s Almanac.

In the frontispiece, engraved by William Faithorne (1616-1691), four female figures, emblematic of England, France, Spain and Italy, stand among trees with a helmeted figure to the right standing guard. This copy contains a later state of the engraving with initials identifying the countries represented. Half-title and title-page in red and black. Rare Books copy gift of Anonymous, for whose generosity and friendship we are ever grateful.

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Book of the Week – Quadragesimale Nouum…de filio prodigo

23 Monday Jun 2014

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antiquarian, Augsburg, Basel, bookbinding, bookplates, books, bookshop, Charles Darwin, Gothic, Johannes Meder, John William Willis-Bund (1843-1928), Michael Furter, Michael Wenssler, New Testament, printer's device, printshop, Prodigal Son, Robert Chambers (1802-1871), Sebastian Brandt, sermons, The University of Utah, theology, type, Wales, woodcuts


Quadragesimale Nouum…de filio prodigo…
Johannes Meder
Basel: Michael Furter, 1494
Editio princips
BX1756 M43 Q4 1494

Johannes Meder’s collection of fifty sermons on the New Testament story of the Prodigal Son is introduced by his close friend Sebastian Brandt. In Brandt’s verse, the Prodigal Son and his guardian angel discuss whoring, gaming, cruelty to the poor and other disturbing issues of the time. Meder wrote, “One must know first the illness, which one intends to heal.” The subject must have been quite compelling – a second edition was printed by Michael Wenssler, also of Basel, in 1497.

Born in Augsburg, Michael Furter (d. 1516/17) was in Basel by 1483, when he bought a house there. He began printing at least at early as 1489. He added bookbinding and then accounting to his trades after his printshop ran into financial difficulties. Furter printed mostly grammars and theology. Although he was financially unsuccessful as a printer, his fairly large number of books were known for their beautiful woodcut ornamentation and illustrations. This work contains eighteen full-page woodcuts. Gothic type, printer’s device.

The University of Utah copy was once owned by Robert Chambers (1802-1871). Chambers anonymously published Vestiges, a Victorian-era best-seller that posited a theory of evolution before Charles Darwin published his ground-breaking thesis. Chambers and Darwin were correspondents.

Chambers and his brother began their careers as publishers and authors when they set up an antiquarian bookshop using their father’s own collection of books. This copy was also part of the library of John William Willis-Bund (1843-1928), a writer on the history of the church in Wales. Evidence of this provenance is the bookplates of both of these men attached within the book.

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