_IN QUEST OF THE PERFECT BOOK_
A book is a portion of the eternal mind
caught in its progress through the world
stamped in an instant, and preserved for
eternity.--_Lord Houghton_ (1809-1885)
[Illustration: QUEEN MARY’S PSALTER, English, 14th Century
_The Last Judgement_
(Brit. Mus. Royal MS. 2B vii, 11 × 7 inches)]
IN QUEST OF THE PERFECT BOOK
REMINISCENCES
& REFLECTIONS
OF A BOOKMAN
WILLIAM DANA ORCUTT
[Illustration: William Dana Orcutt’s printer’s mark]
PUBLISHED · MCMXXVI · BOSTON
LITTLE, BROWN & COMPANY
Copyright, 1926, _by_ Little, Brown
and Company · _All rights reserved_
·.·
Printed in the United States of America
Published September, 1926
·.·
Reprinted October, 1926
Reprinted November, 1926
THE AUTHOR is indebted to the _Atlantic Monthly_
for permission to reprint as the first chapter
of this volume an essay which originally
appeared in that magazine; to the _Christian
Science Monitor_ for permission to use, in
quite different form, certain material which
has been drawn upon in literary editorials
written by him for its columns; to Alban
Dobson, _Esq._, G. Bernard Shaw, _Esq._, Henry
James, _Esq._, _Mrs._ Anne Cobden-Sanderson,
and others, for permission to print personal
letters and photographs.
_To_ ITALY
That great Country whose Master-Spirits
in Art, Typography, and Literature
have contributed most toward
THE PERFECT BOOK
this Volume is Dedicated
FOREWORD TO THE THIRD EDITION
Years ago, I prepared what seemed to me a splendid Foreword to my first
novel, and was much chagrined when I was urged to leave it out. At the
time, the comment that came with the advice seemed a bit brutal: “A
Foreword is an admission on the part of an author that he has failed to
tell his story, or is an insult to the intelligence of his readers.”
Since then my own feelings have come in such complete accord that the
request of my publishers for a Foreword to this Third Edition comes
as a surprise. But, after all, this is not my story, but the story of
the Book, so, as recorder, I must recognize my responsibility. I have
claimed that this story was Romance, but since writing it, Romance has
allied itself to Drama, for the Gutenberg Bible, a copy of which sold
in February for a record price of $120,000, in September achieved the
stupendous value of $305,000! Surely the Book has come into its own!
After devoting a lifetime to printing as an art, I have naturally
been gratified to discover that so large and friendly an army of
readers exists to whom books mean something more than paper and type
and binders’ boards. To many of my readers, the ideas advanced in this
volume apparently have been novel, but appealing: “I have been over the
books in my library,” writes one, “and find many that now take on new
significance.” Another says, “I feel that I have missed much, all these
years, in not knowing how fascinating the story of the Book itself
really is.” Then there are those who are good enough to say that the
story of my adventures has helped to place the art of printing where it
rightfully belongs.
Some of my reviewers and some correspondents seem seriously to think
that I believe the Quest to be ended. Think of the tragedy of having so
alluring an adventure become an accomplished fact,--even granting that
it were possible! Where is the Perfect Book to be found? In the words
of the author or in the heart of the reader? In the design of a type
or in the skill of the typographer or the binder? In the charm of the
paper or in the beauty of the illumination or illustration? It must, of
course, be in the harmonious combination of all of these, but the words
of an author which find a place in one reader’s heart fail to interest
another; the design of a type that is appropriate to one book is not
equally expressive in all.
The word _perfection_ has no place in our language except as an
incentive. To search for it is an absorbing adventure, for it quickens
our senses to perceive much that would otherwise be lost. If perfection
could become commonplace, the Quest would end,--and God pity the world!
Until then each of us will define the Perfect Book in his own words,
each of us will seek it in his own way.
A writer _may_ be born who combines the wisdom of Solomon, the
power of analysis of Henry James, the understanding of Plato, the
philosophy of Emerson, and the style of Montaigne. This manuscript
_may_ be transformed into a book by a printer who can look beyond
his cases of type, and interpret what Aldus, and Jenson, and Etienne,
and Plantin saw, with the artistic temperament of William Morris and
the restraint of Cobden-Sanderson. There _may_ be a binding that
represents the apotheosis of Italian, French, and English elegance.
A reader _may_ be developed through the evolution of the ages
competent to appreciate the contents and the physical _format_
of such a volume, “for what we really seek is a comparison of
experiences.”
Until then the Quest will continue, going constantly onward and upward.
Its lure will keep us from slipping back upon false satisfaction and a
placid but--shall I say?--a dangerous contemplation of the humanistic
idyll.
_William Dana Orcutt_
CONTENTS
I. IN QUEST OF THE PERFECT BOOK 1
Gutenberg
Aldus Manutius
Guido Biagi
Ceriani
Pope Pius XI
Sir Sidney Colvin
II. THE KINGDOM OF BOOKS 35
Eugene Field
John Wilson
Mary Baker Eddy
Bernard Shaw
III. FRIENDS THROUGH TYPE 73
Horace Fletcher
Henry James
William James
Theodore Roosevelt
T. J. Cobden-Sanderson
IV. THE LURE OF ILLUMINATION 109
Byzantine Psalter
Lindisfarne Gospels
Alcuin Bible
Golden Gospels of St. Médard
Psalter of St. Louis
Queen Mary’s Psalter
Bedford Book of Hours
Grimani Breviary
Antiquities of the Jews
Hours of Francesco d’Antonio
Hours of Anne of Brittany
V. FRIENDS THROUGH THE PEN 151
Maurice Hewlett
Austin Dobson
Richard Garnett
Mark Twain
Charles Eliot Norton
William Dean Howells
VI. TRIUMPHS OF TYPOGRAPHY 191
The Beginnings. Germany--The _Gutenberg Bible_
Supremacy of Italy
Nicolas Jenson: Augustinus: _De Civitate Dei_
Aldus Manutius: _Hypnerotomachia Poliphili_
Supremacy of France
Robert Étienne: The _Royal Greeks_
Supremacy of the Netherlands
Christophe Plantin: The _Biblia Polyglotta_
The Elzevirs: _Terence_
Supremacy of England
John Baskerville: _Virgil_
Supremacy of France (second)
The Didots: _Racine_
Supremacy of England (second)
William Morris: The _Kelmscott Chaucer_
Cobden-Sanderson: The _Doves Bible_
VII. THE SPELL of the LAURENZIANA 271
INDEX 301
ILLUSTRATIONS
English Illumination, 14th Century. From _Queen Mary’s
Psalter_, Brit. Mus. Royal MS. 2B vii
(in colors and gold) _Frontis._
John Gutenberg. From Engraving by Alphonse Descaves.
Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris page 6
Aldus Manutius. From Engraving at the British Museum 10
_Dott. Comm._ Guido Biagi. Seated at one of the
_plutei_ in the Laurenziana Library, Florence (1906) 14
Hand-written Humanistic Characters. From Sinibaldi’s
_Virgil_, 1485. Laurenziana Library, Florence 16
Specimen Page of proposed Edition of Dante. To be printed by
Bertieri, of Milan, in Humanistic Type 19
Jenson’s Roman Type. From Cicero: _Rhetorica_, Venice, 1470 22
Emery Walker’s Doves Type. From _Paradise Regained_,
London, 1905 23
Autograph Letter from Charles Eliot Norton 31
Illuminated Page of Petrarch’s _Triumphs_. Set in Humanistic
Type designed by the Author 32
Autograph Page of Eugene Field Manuscript. From _Second Book of
Verse_, New York, 1892 39
Autograph Verse in Field’s own Copy of _Trumpet and Drum_ 41
John Wilson in 1891. Master-Printer 42
Page of Horace Fletcher Manuscript 77
Giambattista Bodoni. From Engraving at the Bibliothèque
Nationale, Paris 78
The Bodoni Letter compared with the Didot Letter 81
Horace Fletcher in 1915 82
Autograph Letter from Henry James to Horace Fletcher 87
Mirror Title. From Augustinus: _Opera._ 1485. Laurenziana
Library, Florence 94
T. J. Cobden-Sanderson. From Etching by Alphonse Legros, 1893 96
Carved Ivory Binding, Jeweled with Rubies and Turquoises. From
_Psalter_ (12th Century). Brit. Mus. Eger. MS. 1139 112
Byzantine Illumination (11th Century). _Psalter_ in Greek.
Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 19352 118
Celtic Illumination (8th Century). _Lindisfarne Gospels._
Brit. Mus. Cotton MS. Nero D. iv 124
Carolingian Handwriting (9th Century). _Alcuin Bible._
Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 10546 126
Carolingian Illumination (9th Century). _Golden Gospels of
St. Médard._ Bibl. Nat. MS. Lat. 8850 128
Gothic Illumination (13th Century). Miniature Page from the
_Psalter of St. Louis_. Bibl. Nat. MS. Lat. 10525 130
Gothic Illumination (13th Century). Text Page from the
_Psalter of St. Louis_. Bibl. Nat. MS. Lat. 10525 132
English Illumination (14th Century). _Queen Mary’s Psalter._
Brit. Mus. Royal MS. 2B. vii 134
French Illumination (15th Century). _Bedford Book of Hours._
Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 18850 136
French Renaissance Illumination (15th Century). _Antiquities
of the Jews._ Bibl. Nat. MS. Français 247 138
Flemish Illumination (15th Century). Miniature Page from the
_Grimani Breviary_. Bibl. S. Marco, Venice 142
Flemish Illumination (15th Century). Text Page from the
_Grimani Breviary_. Bibl. S. Marco, Venice 144
Italian Illumination (15th Century). _Book of Hours_, by
Francesco d’Antonio. R. Lau. Bibl. Ashb. 1874 146
French Illumination (16th Century). Miniature from _Hours of
Anne of Brittany_. Bibl. Nat. MS. Lat. 9474 148
French Illumination (16th Century). Text Page from _Hours of
Anne of Brittany_. Bibl. Nat. MS. Lat. 9474 150
Order for Payment of 1050 _livres tournois_ to Jean Bourdichon
for the _Hours of Anne of Brittany_, 1508 152
Autograph Letter from Maurice Hewlett 161
Autograph Poem by Austin Dobson 167
Mark Twain. At the Villa di Quarto, Florence, 1904.
From a Snap-shot 170
Autograph Letter from Mark Twain. With Snap-shot of Villa di
Quarto 172
Autograph Letter from William Dean Howells 185
Part of a Page from the Vellum Copy of the _Gutenberg Bible_.
Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris 195
Rubricator’s Mark at end of First Volume of a Defective Copy of
the _Gutenberg Bible_, Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris 196
Rubricator’s Mark at end of Second Volume of a Defective Copy of
the _Gutenberg Bible_, Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris 197
Gutenberg, Fust, Coster, Aldus Manutius, Froben. From Engraving
by Jacob Houbraken (1698-1780) 198
John Fust. From an Old Engraving 199
Device and _Explicit_ of Nicolas Jenson 203
Jenson’s Gothic Type. From Augustinus: _De Civitate Dei_,
Venice, 1475 205
Device of Aldus Manutius 208
Grolier in the Printing Office of Aldus. After Painting by
François Flameng. Through Courtesy the Grolier Club, New
York City 208
Text Page from Aldus’ _Hypnerotomachia Poliphili_, Venice, 1499 211
Illustrated Page from Aldus’ _Hypnerotomachia Poliphili_,
Venice, 1499 212
Grolier Binding. Castiglione: Cortegiano. Aldine Press, 1518.
Laurenziana Library, Florence 212
Grolier Binding. Capella: _L’Anthropologia._ Aldine Press,
1533. Laurenziana Library, Florence 214
Robert Étienne. From Engraving by Étienne Johandier Desrochers
(c. 1661-1741) 217
Title Page showing Étienne’s _Royal Greeks_, Paris, 1550 220
Text Page Showing Étienne’s Roman Face 222
Text Page showing Étienne’s _Royal Greeks_, from _Novum Jesu
Christi D. N. Testamentum_, Paris, 1550 222
Christophe Plantin. From Engraving by Edme de Boulonois (c. 1550) 225
Title Page of Plantin’s _Biblia Polyglotta_, Antwerp, 1568 228
Page of Preface of Plantin’s _Biblia Polyglotta_, Antwerp,
1568 229
Text Pages of Plantin’s _Biblia Polyglotta_, Antwerp, 1568 230
Second Page of Plantin’s _Biblia Polyglotta_, Antwerp, 1568 232
Device of Christophe Plantin 236
Title Page of Elzevir’s _Terence_, Leyden, 1635 241
Text Pages of Elzevir’s _Terence_, Leyden, 1635 242
John Baskerville 244
Title Page of Baskerville’s _Virgil_, Birmingham, 1757 247
Text Page of Baskerville’s _Virgil_, Birmingham, 1757 249
Engraving from Didot’s _Racine_, Paris, 1801. By Prud’hon 253
Title Page of Didot’s _Racine_, Paris, 1801 253
Opening Page of Didot’s _Racine_, Paris, 1801 255
Text Page of Didot’s _Racine_, Paris, 1801 256
Firmin Didot. From Engraving by Pierre Gustave Eugène Staal
(1817-1882) 256
William Morris. From Portrait by G. F. Watts, R. A., in
the National Portrait Gallery, London. Painted in 1880 258
Sir Edward Burne-Jones, Bart. From a Photograph at the British
Museum 260
Text Page of _Kelmscott Chaucer_, 1896 262
Title Page of _Doves Bible_, London, 1905 265
Text Page of _Doves Bible_, London, 1905 267
The _Sala Michelangiolo_, in the Laurenziana Library,
Florence 276
_Dott. Comm._ Guido Biagi, in 1924 278
Vestibule of the Laurenziana Library, Florence 280
Miniature Page from the _Biblia Amiatina_, R. Lau. Bibl.
Cod. Amiatinus I 288
Antonio Magliabecchi 293
Library Slips used by George Eliot while working on _Romola_
in Magliabecchian Library, Florence 296
I
IN QUEST OF THE PERFECT BOOK
“Here is a fine volume,” a friend remarked, handing me a copy of _The
Ideal Book_, written and printed by Cobden-Sanderson at the Doves
Press.
“It is,” I assented readily, turning the leaves, and enjoying the
composite beauty of the careful typography, and the perfect impression
upon the soft, handmade paper with the satisfaction one always feels
when face to face with a work of art. “Have you read it?”
“Why--no,” he answered. “I picked it up in London, and they told me it
was a rare volume. You don’t necessarily read rare books, do you?”
My friend is a cultivated man, and his attitude toward his latest
acquisition irritated me; yet after thirty years of similar
disappointments I should not have been surprised. How few, even among
those interested in books, recognize the fine, artistic touches
that constitute the difference between the commonplace and the
distinguished! The volume under discussion was written by an authority
foremost in the art of bookmaking; its producer was one of the few
great master-printers and binders in the history of the world; yet the
only significance it possessed to its owner was the fact that some one
in whom he had confidence had told him it was rare! Being rare, he
coveted the treasure, and acquired it with no greater understanding
than if it had been a piece of Chinese jade.
“What makes you think this is a fine book?” I inquired, deliberately
changing the approach.
He laughed consciously. “It cost me nine guineas--and I like the looks
of it.”
Restraint was required not to say something that might have affected
our friendship unpleasantly, and friendship is a precious thing.
“Do something for me,” I asked quietly. “That is a short book. Read
it through, even though it is rare, and then let us continue this
conversation we have just begun.”
A few days later he invited me to dine with him at his club. “I asked
you here,” he said, “because I don’t want any one, even my family, to
hear what I am going to admit to you. I have read that book, and I’d
rather not know what you thought of my consummate ignorance of what
really enters into the building of a well-made volume--the choice
of type, the use of decoration, the arrangement of margins. Why,
bookmaking is an art! Perhaps I should have known that, but I never
stopped to think about it.”
One does have to stop and think about a well-made book in order to
comprehend the difference between printing that is merely printing and
that which is based upon art in its broadest sense and upon centuries
of precedent. It does require more than a gleam of intelligence to
grasp the idea that the basis of every volume ought to be the thought
expressed by the writer; that the type, the illustrations, the
decorations, the paper, the binding, simply combine to form the vehicle
to convey that expression to the reader. When, however, this fact is
once absorbed, one cannot fail to understand that if these various
parts, which compositely comprise the whole, fail to harmonize with the
subject and with each other, then the vehicle does not perform its full
and proper function.
I wondered afterward if I had not been a bit too superior in my
attitude toward my friend. As a matter of fact, printing as an art has
returned to its own only within the last quarter-century. Looking back
to 1891, when I began to serve my apprenticeship under John Wilson at
the old University Press in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the broadness
of the profession that I was adopting as my life’s work had not as
yet unfolded its unlimited possibilities. At that time the three great
American printers were John Wilson, Theodore L. De Vinne, and Henry O.
Houghton. The volumes produced under their supervision were perfect
examples of the best bookmaking of the period, yet no one of these
three men looked upon printing as an art. It was William Morris who in
modern times first joined these two words together by the publication
of his magnificent Kelmscott volumes. Such type, such decorations, such
presswork, such sheer, composite beauty!
This was in 1895. Morris, in one leap, became the most famous printer
in the world. Every one tried to produce similar volumes, and the
resulting productions, made without appreciating the significance of
decoration combined with type, were about as bad as they could be. I
doubt if, at the present moment, there exists a single one of these
sham Kelmscotts made in America that the printer or the publisher cares
to have recalled to him.
When the first flair of Morris’ popularity passed away, and his
volumes were judged on the basis of real bookmaking, they were
classified as marvelously beautiful _objets d’art_ rather than
books--composites of Burne-Jones, the designer, and William Morris,
the decorator-printer, co-workers in sister arts; but from the
very beginning Morris’ innovations showed the world that printing
still belonged among the fine arts. The Kelmscott books awoke in me
an overwhelming desire to put myself into the volumes I produced. I
realized that no man can give of himself beyond what he possesses,
and that to make my ambition worth accomplishing I must absorb and
make a part of myself the beauty of the ancient manuscripts and the
early printed books. This led me to take up an exhaustive study of the
history of printing.
[Illustration: JOHN GUTENBERG, _c._ 1400-1468
From Engraving by Alphonse Descaves
Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris]
Until then Gutenberg’s name, in my mind, had been preëminent. As
I proceeded, however, I came to know that he was not really the
“inventor” of printing, as I had always thought him to be; that he
was the one who first foresaw the wonderful power of movable types as
a material expression of the thought of man, rather than the creator
of anything previously unknown. I discovered that the Greeks and the
Romans had printed from stamps centuries earlier, and that the Chinese
and the Koreans had cut individual characters in metal.
I well remember the thrill I experienced when I first realized--and
at the time thought my discovery was original!--that, had the Chinese
or the Saracens possessed Gutenberg’s wit to join these letters
together into words, the art of printing must have found its way to
Constantinople, which would have thus become the center of culture and
learning in the fifteenth century.
* * * * *
From this point on, my quest seemed a part of an Arabian Nights’ tale.
Cautiously opening a door, I would find myself in a room containing
treasures of absorbing interest. From this room there were doors
leading in different directions into other rooms even more richly
filled; and thus onward, with seemingly no end, to the fascinating
rewards that came through effort and perseverance.
Germany, although it had produced Gutenberg, was not sufficiently
developed as a nation to make his work complete. The open door led
me away from Germany into Italy, where literary zeal was at its
height. The life and customs of the Italian people of the fifteenth
century were spread out before me. In my imagination I could see the
velvet-gowned agents of the wealthy patrons of the arts searching
out old manuscripts and giving commissions to the scribes to prepare
hand-lettered copies for their masters’ libraries. I could mingle with
the masses and discover how eager they were to learn the truth in
the matter of religion, and the cause and the remedies of moral and
material evils by which they felt themselves oppressed. I could share
with them their expectant enthusiasm and confidence that the advent of
the printing press would afford opportunity to study description and
argument where previously they had merely gazed at pictorial design.
I could sense the desire of the people for books, not to place in
cabinets, but to read in order to know; and I could understand why
workmen who had served apprenticeships in Germany so quickly sought
out Italy, the country where princes would naturally become patrons of
the new art, where manuscripts were ready for copy, and where a public
existed eager to purchase their products.
While striving to sense the significance of the conflicting elements
I felt around me, I found much of interest in watching the scribes
fulfilling their commissions to prepare copies of original manuscripts,
becoming familiar for the first time with the primitive methods of
book manufacture and distribution. A monastery possessed an original
manuscript of value. In its _scriptorium_ (the writing office) one
might find perhaps twenty or thirty monks seated at desks, each with a
sheet of parchment spread out before him, upon which he inscribed the
words that came to him in the droning, singsong voice of the reader
selected for the duty because of his familiarity with the subject
matter of the volume. The number of desks the _scriptorium_ could
accommodate determined the size of this early “edition.”
When these copies were completed, exchanges were made with other
monasteries that possessed other original manuscripts, of which copies
had been made in a similar manner. I was even more interested in the
work of the secular scribes, usually executed at their homes, for it
was to these men that the commissions were given for the beautiful
humanistic volumes. As they had taken up the art of hand lettering from
choice or natural aptitude instead of as a part of monastic routine,
they were greater artists and produced volumes of surpassing beauty. A
still greater interest in studying this art of hand lettering lay in
the knowledge that it soon must become a lost art, for no one could
doubt that the printing press had come to stay.
Then, turning to the office of Aldus, I pause for a moment to read the
legend placed conspicuously over the door:
_Whoever thou art, thou art earnestly requested by Aldus to
state thy business briefly and to take thy departure promptly.
In this way thou mayest be of service even as was Hercules
to the weary Atlas, for this is a place of work
for all who may enter_
[Illustration: ALDUS MANUTIUS, 1450-1515
From Engraving at the British Museum]
But inside the printing office I find Aldus and his associates talking
of other things than the books in process of manufacture. They are
discussing the sudden change of attitude on the part of the wealthy
patrons of the arts who, after welcoming the invention of printing,
soon became alarmed by the enthusiasm of the people, and promptly
reversed their position. No wonder that Aldus should be concerned as
to the outcome! The patrons of the arts represented the culture and
wealth and political power of Italy, and they now discovered in the new
invention an actual menace. To them the magnificent illuminated volumes
of the fifteenth century were not merely examples of decoration,
but they represented the tribute that this cultured class paid to
the thought conveyed, through the medium of the written page, from
the author to the world. This jewel of thought they considered more
valuable than any costly gem. They perpetuated it by having it written
out on parchment by the most accomplished scribes; they enriched it
by illuminated embellishments executed by the most famous artists;
they protected it with bindings in which they actually inlaid gold and
silver and jewels. To have this thought cheapened by reproduction
through the commonplace medium of mechanical printing wounded their
æsthetic sense. It was an expression of real love of the book that
prompted Bisticci, the agent of so powerful a patron as the Duke of
Urbino, to write of the Duke’s splendid collection in the latter part
of the fifteenth century:
_In that library the books are all beautiful in a superlative
degree, and all written by the pen. There is not a single one
of them printed, for it would have been a shame to have one of
that sort._
Aldus is not alarmed by the solicitude of the patrons for the beauty
of the book. He has always known that in order to exist at all
the printed book must compete with the written volume; and he has
demonstrated that, by supplying to the accomplished illuminators
sheets carefully printed on parchment, he can produce volumes of
exquisite beauty, of which no collector need be ashamed. Aldus knows
that there are other reasons behind the change of front on the part
of the patrons. Libraries made up of priceless manuscript volumes
are symbols of wealth, and through wealth comes power. With the
multiplication of printed books this prestige will be lessened, as the
masses will be enabled to possess the same gems of thought in less
extravagant and expensive form. If, moreover, the people are enabled
to read, criticism, the sole property of the scholars, will come into
their hands, and when they once learn self-reliance from their new
intellectual development they are certain to attack dogma and political
oppression, even at the risk of martyrdom. The princes and patrons of
Italy are intelligent enough to know that their self-centered political
power is doomed if the new art of printing secures a firm foothold.
What a relief to such a man as Aldus when it became fully demonstrated
that the desire on the part of the people to secure books in order to
learn was too great to be overcome by official mandate or insidious
propaganda! With what silent satisfaction did he settle back to
continue his splendid work! The patrons, in order to show what a poor
thing the printed book really was, gave orders to the scribes and the
illuminators to prepare volumes for them in such quantities that the
art of hand lettering received a powerful impetus, as a result of which
the hand letters themselves attained their highest point of perfection.
This final struggle on the part of the wealthy overlords resulted only
in redoubling the efforts of the artist master-printers to match the
beauty of the written volumes with the products from their presses.
These Arabian Nights’ experiences occupied me from 1895, when Morris
demonstrated the unlimited possibilities of printing as an art, until
1901, when I first visited Italy and gave myself an opportunity to
become personally acquainted with the historical landmarks of printing,
which previously I had known only from study. In Florence it was my
great good fortune to become intimately acquainted with the late Doctor
Guido Biagi, at that time librarian of the Laurenziana and the Riccardi
libraries, and the custodian of the Medici, the Michelangelo, and the
da Vinci archives. I like to think of him as I first saw him then,
sitting on a bench in front of one of the carved _plutei_ designed
by Michelangelo, in the wonderful _Sala di Michelangiolo_ in the
Laurenziana Library, studying a beautifully illuminated volume resting
before him, which was fastened to the desk by one of the famous old
chains. He greeted me with an old-school courtesy. When he discovered
my genuine interest in the books he loved, and realized that I came as
a student eager to listen to the master’s word, his face lighted up and
we were at once friends.
[Illustration: _Dott. Comm._ GUIDO BIAGI
Seated at one of the _plutei_ in the Laurenziana Library, Florence
(1906)]
In the quarter of a century which passed from this meeting until his
death we were fellow-students, and during that period I never succeeded
in exhausting the vast store of knowledge he possessed, even though
he gave of it with the freest generosity. From him I learned for the
first time of the far-reaching influence of the humanistic movement
upon everything that had to do with the _litteræ humaniores_, and
this new knowledge enabled me to crystallize much that previously had
been fugitive. “The humanist,” Doctor Biagi explained to me, “whether
ancient or modern, is one who holds himself open to receive Truth,
unprejudiced as to its source, and--what is more important--after
having received Truth realizes his obligation to the world to give it
out again, made richer by his personal interpretation.”
This humanistic movement was the forerunner and the essence of the
Renaissance, being in reality a revolt against the barrenness of
mediævalism. Until then ignorance, superstition, and tradition had
confined intellectual life on all sides, but the little band of
humanists, headed by Petrarch, put forth a claim for the mental freedom
of man and for the full development of his being. As a part of this
claim they demanded the recognition of the rich humanities of Greece
and Rome, which were proscribed by the Church. If this claim had been
postponed another fifty years, the actual manuscripts of many of the
present standard classics would have been lost to the world.
The significance of the humanistic movement in its bearing upon the
Quest of the Perfect Book is that the invention of printing fitted
exactly into the Petrarchian scheme by making it possible for the
people to secure volumes that previously, in their manuscript form,
could be owned only by the wealthy patrons. This was the point at which
Doctor Biagi’s revelation and my previous study met. The Laurenziana
Library contains more copies of the so-called humanistic manuscripts,
produced in response to the final efforts on the part of patrons to
thwart the increasing popularity of the new art of printing, than any
other single library. Doctor Biagi proudly showed me some of these
treasures, notably Antonio Sinibaldi’s _Virgil_. The contrast
between the hand lettering in these volumes and the best I had ever
seen before was startling. Here was a hand letter, developed under the
most romantic and dramatic conditions, which represented the apotheosis
of the art. The thought flashed through my mind that all the types in
existence up to this point had been based upon previous hand lettering
less beautiful and not so perfect in execution.
“Why is it,” I demanded excitedly, “that no type has ever been designed
based upon this hand lettering at its highest point of perfection?”
[Illustration: HAND-WRITTEN HUMANISTIC CHARACTERS
From Sinibaldi’s _Virgil_, 1485
Laurenziana Library, Florence (12 × 8 inches)]
Doctor Biagi looked at me and shrugged his shoulders. “This, my
friend,” he answered, smiling, “is your opportunity.”
At this point began one of the most fascinating and absorbing
adventures in which any one interested in books could possibly engage.
At some time, I suppose, in the life of every typographer comes the
ambition to design a special type, so it was natural that the idea
contained in Doctor Biagi’s remark should suggest possibilities which
filled me with enthusiasm. I was familiar with the history of the best
special faces, and had learned how difficult each ambitious designer
had found the task of translating drawings into so rigid a medium as
metal; so I reverted soberly and with deep respect to the subject of
type design from the beginning.
In studying the early fonts of type, I found them exact counterfeits
of the best existing forms of hand lettering at that time employed
by the scribes. The first Italic font cut by Aldus, for instance, is
said to be based upon the thin, inclined handwriting of Petrarch. The
contrast between these slavish copies of hand-lettered models and the
mechanical precision of characters turned out by modern type founders
made a deep impression. Of the two I preferred the freedom of the
earliest types, but appreciated how ill adapted these models were
to the requirements of typography. A hand-lettered page, even with
the inevitable irregularities, is pleasing because the scribe makes a
slight variation in forming the various characters. When, however, an
imperfect letter is cut in metal, and repeated many times upon the same
page, the irregularity forces itself unpleasantly upon the eye. Nicolas
Jenson was the first to realize this, and in his famous Roman type he
made an exact interpretation of what the scribe intended to accomplish
in each of the letters, instead of copying any single hand letter, or
making a composite of many hand designs of the same character. For this
reason the Jenson type has not only served as the basis of the best
standard Roman fonts down to the present time, but has also proved
the inspiration for later designs of distinctive type faces, such as
William Morris’ Golden type, and Emery Walker’s Doves type.
[Illustration: Specimen Page of proposed Edition of Dante.
To be printed by Bertieri, of Milan, in Humanistic Type (8¼ × 6)]
William Morris’ experience is an excellent illustration of the
difficulties a designer experiences. He has left a record of how he
studied the Jenson type with great care, enlarging it by photography,
and redrawing it over and over again before he began designing his own
letter. When he actually produced his Golden type the design was far
too much inclined to the Gothic to resemble the model he selected.
His Troy and Chaucer types that followed showed the strong effect of
the German influence that the types of Schoeffer, Mentelin, and Gunther
Zainer made upon him. The Doves type is based flatly upon the Jenson
model; yet it is an absolutely original face, retaining all the charm
of the model, to which is added the artistic genius of the designer.
Each receives its personality from the understanding and interpretation
of the creator (_pages 22, 23_).
[Illustration: Jenson’s Roman Type. From Cicero: _Rhetorica_, Venice,
1470 (Exact size)]
[Illustration: Emery Walker’s Doves Type. From _Paradise Regained_,
London, 1905 (Exact size)]
From this I came to realize that it is no more necessary for a type
designer to express his individuality by adding or subtracting from his
model than for a portrait painter to change the features of his subject
because some other artist has previously painted it. Wordsworth once
said that the true portrait of a man shows him, not as he looks at any
one moment of his life, but as he really looks all the time. This is
equally true of a hand letter, and explains the vast differences in the
cut of the same type face by various foundries and for the typesetting
machines. All this convinced me that, if I were to make the humanistic
letters the model for my new type, I must follow the example of Emery
Walker rather than that of William Morris.
* * * * *
During the days spent in the small, cell-like alcove which had been
turned over for my use in the Laurenziana Library, I came so wholly
under the influence of the peculiar atmosphere of antiquity that I
felt myself under an obsession of which I have not been conscious
before or since. My enthusiasm was abnormal, my efforts tireless. The
world outside seemed very far away, the past seemed very near, and I
was indifferent to everything except the task before me. This curious
experience was perhaps an explanation of how the monks had been able to
apply themselves so unceasingly to their prodigious labors, which seem
beyond the bounds of human endurance.
My work at first was confined to a study of the humanistic volumes in
the Laurenziana Library, and the selection of the best examples to
be taken as final models for the various letters. From photographed
reproductions of selected manuscript pages, I took out fifty examples
of each letter. Of these fifty, perhaps a half-dozen would be almost
identical, and from these I learned the exact design the scribe
endeavored to repeat. I also decided to introduce the innovation of
having several characters for certain letters that repeated most
frequently, in order to preserve the individuality of the hand
lettering, and still keep my design within the rigid limitations of
type. Of the letter _e_, for instance, eight different designs
were finally selected; there were five _a_’s, two _m_’s,
and so on (see illustration at _page 32_).
After becoming familiar with the individual letters as shown in the
Laurenziana humanistic volumes, I went on to Milan and the Ambrosiana
Library, with a letter from Doctor Biagi addressed to the librarian,
Monsignor Ceriani, explaining the work upon which I was engaged, and
seeking his co-operation. It would be impossible to estimate Ceriani’s
age at that time, but he was very old. He was above middle height, his
frame was slight, his eyes penetrating and burning with a fire that
showed at a glance how affected he was by the influence to which I have
already referred. His skin resembled in color and texture the very
parchment of the volumes he handled with such affection, and in his
religious habit he seemed the embodiment of ancient learning.
After expressing his deep interest in my undertaking, he turned to a
publication upon which he himself was engaged, the reproduction in
facsimile of the earliest known manuscript of Homer’s _Iliad_.
The actual work on this, he explained, was being carried on by his
assistant, a younger priest whom he desired to have me meet. His own
contribution to the work was an introduction, upon which he was then
engaged, and which, he said, was to be his swan song, the final
message from his soul to the world.
“This, I suppose, is to be in Italian?” I inquired.
He looked at me reproachfully. “No, my son,” he answered, with deep
impressiveness; “I am writing my introduction in Latin, which, though
called a dead language, will be living long after the present living
languages are dead.”
Ceriani placed at my disposal the humanistic volumes in the Ambrosiana,
and introduced me to his assistant, whose co-operation was of the
utmost value in my work. I was particularly struck by the personality
of this younger priest. He was in close touch with affairs outside the
Church, and asked searching questions regarding conditions in America.
He spoke several languages with the same facility with which he spoke
his own Italian. His knowledge of books and of bookmaking, past and
present, surprised me. All in all, I found him one of the most charming
men I have ever met. His name was Achille Ratti, and when he became
Bishop of Milan in 1921, and was elevated to the College of Cardinals
two months later, I realized how far that wonderful personality was
taking him. One could scarcely have foreseen, however, that in less
than a year from this time he would become Pope Pius XI.
When, after my drawings were completed, I returned to America, I took
up the matter of the type design with Charles Eliot Norton, my old
art professor at Harvard, then _emeritus_. Professor Norton was
genuinely interested in the whole undertaking, and as the proofs of
the various punches later came into my hands he became more and more
enthusiastic.
I had arranged to use this type in a series of volumes to be published
in London by John Murray, and in America by Little, Brown and Company.
An important question arose as to what should be the first title, and
after careful consideration I decided that as Petrarch was the father
of humanism his _Trionfi_ would obviously be an ideal selection.
The volume was to be printed in English rather than in the original
Italian, and I settled upon Henry Boyd’s translation as the most
distinguished.
Upon investigation it developed that the original edition of this
book was long out of print and copies were exceedingly rare. The only
one I could locate was in the Petrarch collection of the late Willard
Fiske. I entered into correspondence with him, and he invited me to be
his guest at his villa in Florence. With the type completed, and with
proofs in my possession, I undertook my second humanistic Odyssey,
making Florence my first objective. Professor Fiske welcomed me
cordially, and in him I found a most sympathetic personality, eager to
contribute in every way to the success of the undertaking. He placed
the volume of Boyd’s translation in my hands, and asked that I take it
with me for use until my edition was completed.
“This book is unique, and so precious that you certainly could not
permit it to go out of your possession,” I protested.
His answer was characteristic. “Your love of books,” he said, “is such
that this volume is as safe in your hands as it is in mine. Take it
from me, and return it when it has served its purpose.”
Then came the matter of illustrations. In London I had a conference
with Sir Sidney Colvin, then Keeper of Prints and Drawings at the
British Museum. Colvin had been made familiar with the undertaking
by John Murray, who had shown him and Alfred W. Pollard some of the
earliest proofs of the punches that I had sent to England. After a
careful examination of these, both men suggested to Mr. Murray that his
American friend was playing a joke upon him, declaring that the proofs
were hand-lettered and not taken from metal originals!
“There is a fate about this,” Colvin said, after I had explained
my mission. “We have here in the Museum six original drawings of
Petrarch’s _Triumphs_, attributed by some to Fra Filippo Lippi and
certainly belonging to his school, which have never been reproduced.
They are exactly the right size for the _format_ which you have
determined upon, and if you can have the reproductions made here at the
Museum the drawings are at your disposal.”
I made arrangements with Emery Walker, the designer of the Doves type
and justly famous as an engraver, to etch these plates on steel, and
the reproductions of the originals were extraordinarily exact. Those
Walker made for the parchment edition looked as if drawn on ivory.
Parchment was required for the specially illuminated copies which
were to form a feature of the edition, and before leaving America I
had been told that the Roman grade was the best. I naturally assumed
that I should find this in Rome, but my research developed the fact
that Roman parchment is prepared in Florence. Following this lead,
I examined the skins sold by Florentine dealers, but Doctor Biagi
assured me that the best grade was not Roman but Florentine, and that
Florentine parchment is produced in Issoudun, France. It seemed a far
cry to seek out Italian skins in France, but to Issoudun I went. In
the meantime I learned that there was a still better grade prepared in
Brentford, England--this, in fact, being where William Morris procured
the parchment for his Kelmscott publications.
At Brentford I secured my skins; and here I learned something that
interested me exceedingly. Owing to the oil which remains in the
parchment after it has been prepared for use, the difficulty in
printing is almost as great as if on glass. To obviate this, the
concern at Brentford, in preparing parchment for the Kelmscott volumes,
filled in the pores of the skins with chalk, producing an artificial
surface. The process of time must operate adversely upon this
extraneous substance, and the question naturally arises as to whether
eventually, in the Kelmscott parchment volumes, the chalk surface will
flake off in spots, producing blemishes which can never be repaired.
For my own purposes I purchased the skins without the artificial
surface, and overcame the difficulty in printing by a treatment of the
ink which, after much experiment, enabled me to secure as fine results
upon the parchment as if printing upon handmade paper.
The volumes were to be printed in the two humanistic colors, black and
blue. In the original manuscript volumes this blue is a most unusual
shade, the hand letterer having prepared his own ink by grinding
_lapis lazuli_, in which there is no red. By artificial light the
lines written in blue can scarcely be distinguished from the black. To
reproduce the same effect in the printed volume I secured in Florence
a limited quantity of _lapis lazuli_, and by special arrangement
with the Italian Government had it crushed into powder at the Royal
mint. This powder I took home to America, and arranged with a leading
manufacturer to produce what I believe to be the first printing ink
mixed exactly as the scribes of the fifteenth century used to prepare
their pigments.
The months required to produce the _Triumphs_ represented a period
alternating in anxiety and satisfaction. The greatest difficulty came
in pressing upon the typesetter the fact that the various characters of
these letters could not be used with mathematical precision, but that
the change should come only when he felt his hand would naturally alter
the design if he were writing the line instead of setting the type.
The experiments required to perfect an ink that should successfully
print on the oily parchment were not completed without disappointments
and misgivings; the scrupulous care required in reading proofs and
perfecting the spacing, was laborious and monotonous; the scrutinizing
of the sheets as they came from the press was made happier when the
success of the _lapis lazuli_ ink was assured.
[Illustration: _A Page from an Autograph Letter from Charles Eliot
Norton_]
The rewards came when Professor Norton gave the volume his unqualified
approval--“so interesting and original in its typography and in its
illustrations, so admirable in its presswork, its paper, its binding,
and its minor accessories, ... a noble and exemplary work of the
printers’ art”; when George W. Jones, England’s artist-printer,
pronounced the Humanistic type “the most beautiful face in the world,”
and promised to use it in what he hopes to be his masterpiece, an
edition of Shakespeare’s _Sonnets_; when the jury appointed by the
Italian Government to select “the most beautiful and most appropriate
type face to perpetuate the divine Dante” chose the Humanistic type,
and placed the important commission of producing the definitive edition
of the great poet, to commemorate his sexcentenary, in the hands
of that splendid printer, Bertieri, at Milan. Such rewards are not
compliments, but justification. Such beauty as the Humanistic type
possesses lies in the artistic ability and the marvelous skill in
execution of the scribes. My part was simply seizing the development of
a period apparently overlooked, and undertaking the laborious task
of translating a beautiful thing from one medium to another.
[Illustration: PETRARCH’S _TRIUMPHS_
Illuminated Page (10 × 6 inches)
Set in Humanistic Type designed by the Author]
The Quest of the Perfect Book must necessarily lead the seeker into
far varying roads, the greatest rewards being found in straying from
the main street into the fascinating bypaths. My quest has resulted
in giving me greater appreciation of the accomplishments of those who
successfully withstood opposition and persecution in order to make the
printed book a living vehicle to convey the gems of thought from great
minds to the masses, never forgetful of the value of beauty in its
outward aspect. I believe it possible today to perpetuate the basic
principles of the early artist master-printers by applying beauty to
low-cost books as well as to limited _editions de luxe_. The story of
the printed book itself is greater than that contained between the
covers of any single volume, for without it the history of the world
would show the masses still plodding on, swathed in theological and
encyclopædic bonds, while the few would still be jealously hoarding
their limited knowledge
II
THE KINGDOM OF BOOKS
A paraphrase of, “Would that mine adversary had written a book,” might
well be, “Would that mine enemy had _printed_ a book”; for the
building of books has always yielded smaller financial returns for the
given amount of labor and ability than is offered in any other line of
intelligent human effort.