Ladies' Book-plates: An Illustrated Handbook for Collectors and Book-lovers FIRST EDITION
London: George Bell & Sons, 1895.
First Edition. Hardcover. Bound in cloth that's plain but ever green, this survey of the history of women's book-plates, possibly the first of its kind in English, certainly offers its subject the spotlight—being fully illustrated in over 200 bookplates reproduced in vignettes and in full-page illustrations throughout, as well as a tissue-guarded frontispiece and 9 plates printed from the original plates, including one in full color.
This study of women's bookplates includes: English ladies' plates from the 17th and 18th centuries; notable women bibliophiles; women's heraldic bookplates; examples of bookplates for women by designers such as Robert Anning Bell, Joseph Walter West, Harry Napper, including Alan Wright's bookplate design for novelist L. T. Meade, Walter Crane's bookplate for artist and activist May Morris, William Henry Margetson's design for playwright and suffragette Bessie Lyle Hatton, and more; a chapter devoted to "lady designers" including Kate Greenaway, Margaret Sargent Florence, Edith Greene, Agnes Castle, H. Isabel Adams; mottoes on ladies' bookplates; joint bookplates for married booklovers; a sampling of French, German, and Russian ladies' bookplates; concluding with a 100-page alphabetical reference for women's bookplates. As author Norna Labouchere writes in her introduction: "It only remains for me to express my sincerest thanks to....the shades of the noble women celebrated for their talents, wit, and beauty, who have left behind these dainty personal records of their fondness for books."
7 1/2" X 5 1/2". x, [iv], 358pp. Bound in light green cloth over boards, with upper board and spine lettered in gilt. Moderate wear to binding, with pronounced tea stain to bottom corner of upper board, slight lean to sunned spine, bumping to corners, and light soiling to cloth. Rear hinge cracked and reinforced with archival adhesive; binding remains sound. Armorial bookplate of John Basil Walters to front pastedown. Occasional pencilled note or light foxing to pages throughout. Profusely illustrated. A volume in George Bell & Sons' Ex-Libris series. Good +. Item #16550
Price: $285.00