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Chaucer`s Works

Lot 83
06.10.2022 12:00UTC -05:00
Classic
Sold
$ 60 480
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUSA, New York
Archive
The auction is completed. No bids can be placed anymore.
Archive
ID 813696
Lot 83 | Chaucer's Works
Estimate value
$ 20 000 – 30 000
Chaucer's Works

Shakespeare Head Press, 1928-9. Vellum copy

CHAUCER, Geoffrey (1340-1400). The Workes. Oxford: Shakespeare Head Press, 1928-1929.



“Nothing in the private press movement gives quite such jeweled splendor as this”—Colin Franklin



The pristine Garden copy: One of only 11 printed on vellum, from a total edition of 386. This is the most charming and sympathetic of all the three important modern fine press editions of Chaucer (the others by Kelmscott and Golden Cockerel Presses). The chosen Caslon type is very inviting and the exquisitely hand-colored woodcuts are inspired by the illuminations and illustrations found in early manuscripts and books. There are 45 pilgrims that wander the margins of the Canterbury Tales, for example, chiefly inspired by the figures in the the early 15th century Ellesmere Chaucer (Huntington MS EL 26 C 9). The overall result is "very rich—especially in the vellum copies, for which the local art school at Stratford provided students who could colour and lay gold with brilliant effect. The illumination seems as fine as the old French work it imitates. Nothing in the private press movement gives quite such jeweled splendor as this” (Franklin, quoted in the Garden sale catalogue).



Eight volumes, quarto (280 x 191mm.). 70 hand-colored woodcut illustrations, many heightened with gold and silver, by Lynton H. Lamb after various manuscript and early book sources; 20 hand-colored woodcut diagrams in A Treatise on the Astrolabe, calligraphic half-titles, title-pages, and contents pages in red and black by Joscelyne Gaskin, paragraph marks in red and blue, first initial in gold, other initials and section headings printed in blue after designs by Gaskin, some shoulder notes printed in blue, occasional text printed in red and blue. Original limp vellum, spines calligraphed in red and black by Gaskin, red silk ties. Original red cloth folding-cases, printed paper spine labels (some cases started at hinges, faded). Provenance: Haven O'More (bookplates, The Garden Sale, Sotheby's New York, 9-10 November 1989, lot 284).

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