The second volume of the five-volume Doves Press Bible has just appeared. Printed on a hand press and using an elegant and simple typeface, red initial letters are the only decoration in the book Nothing is so sad, writes Mr. Charles Rowley, as to see the finest things lost or obscured to us. This is true in many respects of our noblest treasure, the Bible in English. In the noble subscription edition in five volumes which Mr. Cobden Sanderson and Mr. Emery Walker are issuing from the Doves Press, and of which the second volume has just appeared, for the first time we see that marvellous cluster of divine things, pure and dignified in form, exquisitely printed as literature, and free from all notes or other excrescences.It is something, surely, that in our own day such a masterpiece of workmanship can be and is produced. I know nothing in that wonderful Bible-room at the Rylands Library so chaste, so dignified, and so all round perfect as this great production. Mr. Emery Walker is well known as one of the best experts on the printed book. He helped Morris from the first with the Kelmscott Press. Mr. Cobden-Sanderson is one of those who leave a learned profession to do something as a craftsman. He works at the bench, and is acknowledged to be the premier binder of books. Examples of his craft may be seen in our Arts and Crafts Museum at the Municipal School of Art. It is this combination that has produced a technical masterpiece in an age where quantity is worshipped and... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2015-03-10 00:00:00 UTC ]