Ecclesiastes; | The Preacher | From the King James Version of 1611 | Wood Engravings by Larry Thompson | With an Afterword by the Printer.
[Merrickville, Ontario]: Greyweathers Press, 2017 [in roman numerals]. Octavo, 25.5 x 17.3 cm. Cased in quarter burgundy cloth and marbled paper over boards. Brown Canson Mi-Teintes endpapers. Top and bottom edges trimmed; fore-edges opened but untrimmed. Unpaginated [pp. 80]. The boards are slightly bowed, owing possibly to the grain of the covering paper. Else fine. “Time passed. Summer’s heat and Winter’s frosts came and went three times between the Autumns of 2014 and 2017. The work continued in fits and starts, through periods of fear, crisis, and grief, as one generation passed away, and another arrived. This Greyweathers Ecclesiastes is printed from cold type in Italian Oldstyle typeface on Arches Wove paper. The printer cut the wood engraving illustrations on blocks supplied by Paul Demers. Holly Dean created the versal capitals that begin each chapter… The lion head engraving on page 38 was executed under the tutelage of Wesley Bates. The printer is indebted to his able and thorough apprentice, Maxwell Kent, the Punk Printer, for setting, printing, and dissing portions of the text.” Holly Dean’s dropped capitals were rendered and cut as wood engravings by Larry Thompson; they were printed in purple. The text is illustrated with a total of 60 wood engravings, all printed from the blocks. Five of the engravings, including the frontispiece, are full page. The frontispiece is composed of two blocks and was printed in brown and purple. With the exception of a few in purple, the engravings were printed in a shade of purple-tinged brown (close to caput mortuum). From an edition of 100 copies, the present copy being number 21. Numbered and signed in pencil by Larry Thompson on the colophon page. Item #371
“[… ] If this work is truly an artistic act of secular penance, then it is fitting to say that it is also an act of vanity- futile and meaningless. Printing books by hand, with hand cut engravings and hand set type on beautiful papers destined for select collections smacks of ambition, self-indulgence and vanity. Certainly the Preacher would say so. Regardless, I take refuge in this pocket of vanity, and strive to find meaning in it, no matter how futile that may be.” — Larry Thompson, from the Afterword.
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