65
65 FLINT, William Russell (illus.); HOMER. The Odyssey of Homer. London: The Medici Society, 1924 INSCRIBED BY THE ILLUSTRATOR Limited edition, number 502 of 530 copies, presentation copy, inscribed by the illustrator “To Mr Jas. McDiarmid, With warmest regards from Mr and Mrs Russell Flint, Feb. 1926” on front free endpaper. A note within the volume states that “the original drawings for this edition were completed in 1914”. Gardner notes that “Homer’s Odyssey was to be delayed until the end of the First World War” but was not published until 1924. It was a popular title for Flint, with reprints in 1930, 1936 and 1949 (although Flint himself thought the reproductions, at least of the 1949 reprint, were “poor”). A contemporary advert issued by the Medici Society stated “Butcher and Lang’s translation of the Odyssey has been proved by a generation of scholars. It is not surprising that it has inspired Mr Russell Flint to perhaps the finest illustrations he has yet done”. James McDiarmid (1855–1934) immigrated to Canada from Scotland and founded a construction firm, working as an architect. He was responsible for many churches in Winnipeg, served as Chairman of the Winnipeg Parks Board and was largely responsible for founding the Municipal Golf Course. His bookplate appears to have been designed by Annie French.
66
66 FRANK, Robert. Les Américains. Paris: Robert Delpire, 1958 ARGUABLY THE MOST RENOWNED PHOTOBOOK First edition of Robert Frank’s masterpiece, in which his photographs are accompanied by the words of authors such as Simone de Beauvoir, Erskine Caldwell, William Faulkner, Henry Miller, and John Steinbeck. Frank’s work “has become so much the photobook of legend in its first American edition that it is often forgotten that Delpire’s original Paris edition was a different book. Its accompanying texts, gathered by Alain Bosquet, placed it more in a socio-documentary context – with a politically antagonistic, even anti- American point of view. What has made this arguably the most renowned photobook of all? Firstly, and perhaps most importantly, the majority of the pictures are instantly memorable, ‘dry, lean, and transparent,’ as John Szarkowski has said of them, yet also weighty and profound, even heartstopping. Secondly, there is the sequencing . . . Ideas ebb and flow, are introduced, discarded, recapitulated, transfigured, transposed, played off and piled up against each other with the exuberant energy of a Charlie Parker saxophone solo” (Parr & Badger). Oblong octavo. Original laminated boards decorated with a design by Saul Steinberg. Illustrated throughout with
Quarto. Original cream cloth, two black morocco lettering pieces to spine, top edge gilt. Colour frontispiece and 19 colour plates mounted on white paper, with tissue guards, all by W. Russell Flint. Bookplate of James McDiarmid to front pastedown. Light soiling to binding, minor loss to lettering pieces, some light browning to edges, numerous gatherings unopened; a near-fine copy. ¶ Gardner, Sir William Russell Flint . . . a catalogue raisonné , 1994, p. 117. £1,250 [153900]
66
36
SUMMER 2022
Made with FlippingBook Online newsletter maker