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THE RUBAIYAT OF OMAR KHAYYAM. . . . WITH ILLUSTRATIONS PHOTOGRAPHED FROM LIFE STUDIES BY ADELAIDE HANSCOM AND BLANCHE CUMMING.
(New York: Dodge Publishing Company, 1912). 265 x 195 mm. (10 1/4 x 8"). Title page and 52 unnumbered leaves, printed on recto only. Translated by Edward FitzGerald.
EXCELLENT TEAL CRUSHED MOROCCO, GILT, BY THE HARCOURT BINDERY (stamp-signed on verso of front free endpaper), covers framed by multiple plain and dotted rules enclosing a twining grapevine, central panel with palmette and floral cornerpieces, raised bands, spine compartments densely gilt, LOVELY CITRON MOROCCO DOUBLURES, EACH with large oval medallion at center CONTAINING ONE OF THE COLOR ILLUSTRATIONS BY HANSCOM & CUMMINGS enclosed by a graceful gilt frame, corners with intricate gilt vines bearing clusters of onlaid burgundy morocco grapes, fawn-colored moiré silk endleaves, top edge gilt, other edges untrimmed (joints expertly repaired). In an early (original?) blue cloth dust jacket. With 26 (of 28, two having been used for the doublures) memorably intriguing tipped-on color plates by Adelaide Hanscom and Blanche Cummings, all with tissue guards, and the text with Orientalist decorations, those on the title and opening pages hand-colored and highlighted with gilt. Paas 1513. Spine evenly darkened, title page with small tears at inner margin, lower corner of one plate torn at tip (image unaffected), other trivial imperfections, but still quite an attractive copy--clean, fresh, and bright, the leaves with vast margins, and the heavily-gilt binding lustrous.
This is an especially appealing copy of a ground-breaking illustrated edition of the Rubaiyat in an elaborate binding, with splendid doublures created by a prominent American workshop using images from two of the color plates in the work. One of the early women pioneers in the field, San Francisco photographer Adelaide Hanscom (1875-1931) began working on photographs to illustrate the Rubaiyat in 1903, and called on members of the Bay Area's bohemian literary and artistic community to serve as models, among them "Poet of the Sierras" Joaquin Miller (the white-bearded sage in our illustrations), Charles Sterling, George Wharton James, and Charles Keeler. Hanscom was already making a name for herself as a portrait photographer and as a member of the Pictorialism movement, defined by Britannica as "an approach to photography that emphasizes beauty of subject matter, tonality, and composition rather than the documentation of reality." Those characteristics are on prominent display in her Rubaiyat images, first published as sepia-toned photogravures in 1905. This work caused a sensation and won Hanscom international attention, including a silver medal at the Liverpool Exposition in England. Perhaps more meaningful to Hanscom was the notice of the great Alfred Stieglitz, who made her an Associate Member of his Photo-Secession and included two of her prints in an exhibition at the Little Galleries of the Photo-Secession (later known as "219") in New York. The San Francisco earthquake of 1906 destroyed the studio of Hanscom and her partner Cumming, including all the negatives of the Rubaiyat plates. The photographs copyrighted by Dodge Publishing were all that remained. The Getty Center, which owns a copy of this work, suggests that Hanscom and Cumming created the plates here by hand-coloring the photographs, and the title of our edition implies those "Life Studies" were then photographed for this work. The memorable binding is by Boston's Harcourt Bindery, founded in 1900 to provide hand bookbinding services for the publications of the burgeoning number of private presses created by the Arts & Crafts Movement in New England. The binders took two of the color plates from the work--the frontispiece and the final image from the 1905 edition--to create centerpieces for the doublures, adding a gilt and onlaid grape arbor that evokes imagery from the poem. The Harcourt Bindery remains the largest bindery in the United States exclusively devoted to fine bookbinding by hand. (ST17640-391)
Price: $6,000.00