1937 The Illustrations of William Blake For Thornton's Virgil with the First Eclogue and the Imitation by Ambrose Philips

Description

First Edition, Illustrated, Limited Edition, Publishers' Original Binding, Signed

Limited edition, printed at the Curwen press. This copy is numbered 446 of 1000 copies. Signed by Geoffrey Keynes, who wrote the introduction to this work. First edition thus. The Nonesuch Press specialised in limited edition and private press. They were founded by Francis Meynell, his second wife Vera Mendel and their friend David Garnett. Their aspiration was for their publications to be aligned with the same aesthetic standards as the private press movement. They were unusual as they used a small Albion press to design the books, but had them printed by commercial printers. In doing so, books with the quality of a fine-press were produced, but available to a wider audience at lower prices. A fascinating work, which looks at the illustrations of English print-maker and seminal figure in the field of visual arts, William Blake. With Thornton's 'First Eclogue' printed to accompany the images. From the library of John Lawson, a bookseller and collector. In the rear pocket to the work there are fourteen of the seventeen electrotype prints. A very bright work.