Category Archives: Books

books

Female Equitation

Mrs. Stirling Clarke, The Ladies’ Equestrian Guide, or, The Habit & the Horse: a treatise on female equitation, with illustrations lithographed by Messrs. Day & Son, from photographs by Herbert Watkins (London: Day & Son, [1857]). 9 plates, tinted lithographics by Day & Son after photographs by Herbert Watkins (1828-1916). Graphic Arts Off-Site Storage 2021- in process.

Nannie Lambert Power O’Donoghue (1843-1940) and A. Chantrey Corbould (1852-1920), Riding for Ladies, with Hints on the Stable (London: William Clowes & Sons for W. Thacker & Co., Calcutta, Thacker, Spink, & Co., and Bombay, Thacker & Co., 1887). Woodburytype frontispiece. Graphic Arts Off-Site Storage 2021- in process

 

The Graphic Arts Collection is fortunate to have acquired two works by female authors concerning horsemanship for upper class women in the 19th century. It is unfortunate that the earliest by a Mrs. Clarke cannot be identified with her own name but only by her husband’s. Written in 1857, Clarke’s book comes a full twenty year before that of Nannie Power O’Donoghue’s work. It is a thorough discussion of horsemanship including notes on stabling, training, shoeing, and doctoring, by and for women.

Mrs. Stirling is a mystery beyond her marriage, she even leaves her name off the title page, preface, or introduction. Her preface begins by assuring any man reading the book that he need not worry. She has no desire to “trench upon ground hitherto trodden by the more privileged sex” nor does she offer “any suggestion for their enlightenment.” So, if you are of the male sex, shut your computer and stop reading.

Stirling continues, “I write exclusively for the guidance of my own sex, well knowing the vast importance to the fair novice of a manual which brings her acquainted with that equal pride of prince and peasant—the horse—and with the fascinating and elegant science which teaches how to guide and govern him, and how to guide and govern herself with respect to this noble creature.” Riding well needs training, as Stirling quotes, “True knowledge comes from study, not by chance, As those move easiest who have learned to dance.”

 

 

Riding was in the mid-nineteenth century a regular activity among women, as she comments: “Some years ago, riding was by no means general amongst the fair sex; then ladies on horseback were the exception and not, as now, the rule, but “grace à notre charmante Reine,”

“Whose high zeal for healthy duties
Set on horseback half our beauties,”

there is now scarcely a young lady of rank, fashion, or respectability, but includes riding in the list of her accomplishments; and who, whether attaining her end or not, is not ambitious of being considered by her friends and relatives, “a splendid horsewoman.’ Yet how few can really claim this envied appellation! Habit may do much, and, coupled with science, a great deal more; but good riding, with very few exceptions, is neither a habit nor an instinct. Dancing we all know to be an instinctive motion, a natural expression of joy ; but mark the dancing of the rustic milkmaid, and that of the educated and accomplished lady; the one is an untutored, clumsy bound, the other the very poetry of motion ; and the latter should riding be.”

 

The second acquisition by a woman for women is Nannie Lambert Power O’Donoghue‘s Riding for Ladies [top] with illustrations by A. Chantrey Corbould (1852-1920). Perhaps it was her athleticism that allowed Power O’Donoghue, also known as Ann Stewart Lyster Lambert, to live to be 97 years old. While she wrote many books, she was best known for Ladies on Horseback, followed a few years later by Riding for Ladies (1887).

Originally published in a series of articles in the Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News and Lady’s Pictorial, Riding for Ladies brought her writing together in a book so popular it is recorded as selling “more than 94,000 copies.” Unlike Stirling, her name is proudly announced on the title page and the book is filled with her many achievements and personal stories.

 

 

 

The Supreme Court and Paper Collars

Isaac Robert Cruikshank (1789-1856), Dandies Dressing, November 2, 1818. Hand colored etching. From Dandies series published by Thomas Tegg. Graphic Arts Collection. I.R.Cruikshank prints

 

High white collars came into fashion for men in the 18th century, at a time when the shirt, collar, and cravat were all washed and bleached together, causing considerable time and trouble for wives and maids. The invention of the removable collar has been claimed, at least in the United States, by Hannah Montague of “Collar City” (Troy, NY). As early as 1827, Montague came up with the idea of cutting one collar off her husband’s shirt that could be laundered separately and then buttoned back onto various shirts. See also:
https://hoxsie.org/2012/02/06/how_the_collar_city_got_its_name/

Most histories agree the first patent for a disposable paper collar was granted to the New York inventor Walter Hunt (1796-1859) on July 25, 1854 (who was also responsible for an early sewing machine and the first safety pin). In Philadelphia, William E. Lockwood established his own collar company a few years later but it wasn’t until the US Civil War and a cotton shortage that the sale of paper collars exploded.

 

In 1863 Lockwood bought or otherwise acquired the patents held by Solomon Gray and Andrew Evans. He then gathered 19 paper collar manufacturers together to form The Union Paper Collar Company, presuming they would control the market. The company placed warnings in local newspapers around the country telling people not to buy from any firm other than Union Paper Collar Co. Lawsuits were threatened.

For Christmas 1865, the New York Times ran a promotional story of a shopping trip a reporter took with an out-of-towner called O’Leum. Various shops and their merchandise were described, including S.W.H. Ward’s paper collars: “O’Leum has heard of WARD’s perfect fitting shirts and WARD’s handsome paper collars and cuffs for ladies and gentlemen. He therefore insists upon a visit to Mr. S.W.H. WARD, at No. 387 Broadway. The only wonder is that O’Leum, who appears to be an incorrigible traveler, and has almost wearied our reporter, does not also propose a trip to WARD’s other store, at Nos. 323 Montgomery-street, San Francisco. WARD sells O’Leum a gross of India-rubber enameled collars and cuffs and we are off … “–NYT December 21, 1865.

 

Ward was among the companies that did not want to join the Union Paper Collar Co monopoly and so, in 1866 they formed their own collective known as the United States Paper Collar Manufacturers’ Association.  Ward published his own advertisement [at the top], offering $20,000 if Lockwood or any member of the Union Paper Collar Company went forward with a lawsuit.

Only years later did several small suits move forward, one as far as the United States Supreme Court: the Union Paper Collar Co VS Van Dusen in October 1, 1874, which Lockwood lost.

The transcript is a wonderful document, with full descriptions of how the paper for collars was made, how it was cut and fashioned, as well as the machines used for these processes. The Court said new machines could be patented but not the original concept of a removable paper collar, which had already been created. Here’s a short section:

“After the “stock” — best rags or what else — is sorted and cut, it is generally cleaned by boiling, and finally put, with the requisite quantity of water, into the “beating engine,” where it is beaten or ground into pulp. The beating engine is simply a vat divided into two compartments by a longitudinal partition, which, however, leaves an opening at either end. In one compartment a cylinder revolves, called the “roll,” its longitudinal axis being at right angles to the length of the vat. In this cylinder, and parallel with its axis, are inserted a number of blades or knives which project from its circumference. Directly beneath the roll, upon the bottom of the vat, is a horizontal plate, called the bed-plate, which consists of several bars or knives, similar and parallel to those of the roll, bolted together. The roll is so arranged that it can be raised or lowered, and also the speed of its revolutions regulated at pleasure. The vat being filled with rags and water, in due proportion, the mass is carried beneath the roll, and between that and the bed-plate, and passing round through the other compartment of the vat, again passes between the bed-plate and roll, and so continues to revolve until the whole is beaten into pulp of the requisite fineness and character for the paper for which it is intended. When the beating first begins, the roll is left at some distance from the bed-plate, and is gradually lowered as the rags become more disintegrated and ground up. The management of the beating engine is left to the skill and judgment of the foreman in charge. The knives may be sharp or dull, the roll may be closely pressed upon the bed-plate or slightly elevated, the bars and knives may have the angles which they make with each other altered, so that they either cut off sharply, like the blades of scissors, or tear the rags more slowly as they pass between them. The duration of the beating also varies according to the nature of the pulp, the length of fiber required, the condition of the knives &c.; and the speed of the revolutions given to the roll is varied in like manner.

 

One of the many companies saved by this ruling was the Reversible Collar Company in Cambridge, Massachusetts, whose factory building is still standing at 25–27 Mt. Auburn & 10–14 Arrow Streets, although no paper collars are being produced.

Croquet

Henry Martin (Class of 1948, 1925-2020) Man playing croquet (no date). Graphic Arts Collection GA 2011.00360. Gift of David Reeves, Class of 1948.

 

A simple question about James Tissot’s Croquet drypoint today [see below], led down a rabbit hole to many other croquet references.

According to The Lewis Carroll handbook (1962), Reverend Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832-1898), wrote Croquêt Castles. For Five Players in May 1863 while the Christ Church Mathematical Lecturer. He was also a founding member of the Overland Mallet Club and an avid croquet player. In Dodgson’s version of the game, each player has two balls, which are maneuvered through eight arches and four pegs. Unlike Alice in Wonderland, players take turns rather than playing simultaneously. More rules can be read here: https://www.spudart.org/chicagocroquet/rules/castle/index.html


This copy of Dodgson’s pamphlet (one folded sheet) is from the Morris L. Parrish library, now at Princeton rather than Oxford, where it was “decided that the items constituted a shrine rather than a comprehensive collection of original artifacts. They turned [Parrish] down, declaring that theirs was an educational institution rather than a museum.” – Alexander Wainwright, “The Morris L. Parrish Collection of Victorian Novelists,” Princeton University Library Chronicle 62, no. 3 (Spring 2001)

 

Croquet achieved enormous popularity in the 1860s, first mentioned at Princeton in 1868 when a student wrote, “Croquet has lately been brought into the campus and become quite fashionable. Games may be seen at any time during the day, surrounded by a little crowd of admiring spectators.” —Nassau Literary Magazine June 1, 1868.

Nassau Literary Magazine June 1, 1870

Daily Princetonian April 30, 2015

The National Croquet Association (NCA), founded in 1879, held its first national tournament in 1882. By April 30, 2015, the Daily Princetonian noted their club was playing in a national tournament.

 

Horace Elisha Scudder (1838-1902), The Game of Croquet: its Appointments and Laws; with descriptive illustrations by R. Fellows [psued.] (New York: Hurd and Houghton, 1866). Frontispiece by Augustus Hoppin (1828-1896). Graphic Arts Collection Hamilton 883

 

 

 

In 1936, H.G. Wells (1866-1946) wrote a ghost story called The Croquet Player, illustrated by Harold Jones (1904-1992). Goodreads describes it:
“This allegorical satire about a man fleeing from his evil dreams was written under the influence of the Spanish Civil War. The croquet player, comfortably sipping a vermouth, listens to the strange & terrible tale of the haunted countryside of Cainsmarsh–a horror which broadens & deepens until it embraces the world.as told to a cocktail drinking croquet player.”
Published London: Chatto & Windus, 1936). Ex 3982.95.3275 1936.
 

 

Laterna magica. Magic Lantern. Lanterne Magique ([Germany?] : E. P. [i.e. Ernst Plank], [1900?]). Metal lantern with 12 glass slides, col. ill. Cotsen Children’s Library Opticals 22898.

 

 

James Tissot (1836–1902), Croquet, 1878. Etching and drypoint. Museum purchase, Felton Gibbons Fund (2013-112) Princeton University Art Museum

 

An Outline of Society in Our Own Times


When asked recently whether George Cruikshank’s print “An Outline of Society in Our Own Times,” from his rare four volume Our Own Times (1846), was an etching or a glyphograph, we pulled both of the sets in Graphic Arts, as well as a scrapbook of Cruikshank illustrations. The plate is a glyphograph, one of 34 in the whole book, with a single etching in each volume and 6 woodcuts throughout.

George Cruikshank (1792-1878), “An Outline of Society in Our Own Times,” from Our Own Times ([London]: Bradbury & Evans, 1846). No. 1 (Apr. 1846)-no. 4 (July 1846). Graphic Arts Collection Cruik 1846.2

 

How can you tell an etching (intaglio) from a glyphograph (relief)? Look for the absence of a plate mark. On poor or cheap printing, you will also see some ink in the white areas, where the pressure has pushed the paper below the metal relief line.

 

The print features four women, beginning at the top center, personifying Science, Industry, Folly (seen above blowing bubbles), and Crime, with children of the various attitudes surrounding each. Cruikshank was still a heavy drinker in 1845-46—signing a vow of abstinence in 1847—and so the lower portions of society ruled by folly and crime still seems quite appealing.

 

We are fortunate to have a number of scrapbooks holding illustrations, proofs, newspaper clippings, letters, and more Cruikshank material. The one pictured here “Scrapbook of illustrations, 1839-1865” has 394 p. in a half morocco binding 57 x 38 cm. It was a gift from Alex van Rensseler, Class of 1871. The spine lists a few of the books contained inside. Unfortunately the paste used to fix the print to the album page is in many cases eating into the sheet and leaving intrusive marks.

Here are some additional pages from the scrapbook of Cruikshank illustrations.

Note in “The Triumph of Cupid” not only several self portraits of Cruikshank but enslaved European, African, and Middle Eastern men in chains at the bottom of this imaginary scene.

 

Odysseas Elytes and Costa Coulentianos

Odysseas Elytēs (1911-1996), Θάνατος και ανάστασις του Κωνσταντίνου Παλαιολόγου [= Thanatos kai anastasis tou Kōnstantinou Palaiologou = The Death and Resurrection of Constantine Palaiologus] (Chavannes-sur-Reyssouze, 1971). Blind embossed engravings by Costa Coulentianos (1918-1995). Acquired with matching funds provided by the Program in Hellenic Studies with the support of the Stanley J. Seeger Hellenic Fund. Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2021- in process

 

“On May 29, 1453, the Ottoman army, led by Mehmed the Conqueror, seized Constantinople, putting a violent end to one of the longest-lasting empires in history. Along with it, the seizing of the great city also ended the life of the last emperor of Byzantium, Constantine Palaiologos.

The legends that sprang up around the Fall of Constantinople are a large part of Christian Orthodox and Hellenic tradition. Even after the liberation from the Ottomans — even today, to be honest — there are Greeks who continue to believe that one day Consntantinople will become Greek once again.”— Greek Reporter July 6, 2020

Nobel Prize winner Odysseas Elytēs (1911-1996) drew on the mythology of Constantine Palaiologus for his epic poem Death and Resurrection of Constantine Paolaiologus, which in turn was the inspiration for the Greek sculptor Costa Coulentianos’ blind embossed artists’ book. Written in modern Greek, printed by Duo d’Art in Switzerland, and published in France, this is truely an international publication.

 

Μανιφέστο του Κομμουνιστικού Κόμματος


Herbert Sandberg (1908-1991), Μανιφέστο του Κομμουνιστικού Κόμματος / Χαρακτικά [= Manifesto of the Communist Party = Bilder zum Kommunistischen Manifest] (Κωδικός προϊόντος, unknown). Acquired with matching funds provided by the Program in Hellenic Studies with the support of the Stanley J. Seeger Hellenic Fund. Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2021- in process.

 

 

The Graphic Arts Collection acquired this rare modern Greek edition of the German artist Herbert Sandberg’s satirical manifesto, containing the full text of Karl Marx’s Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei (1848), with graphics by Sandberg. A complete chronology and biography for the artist can be found here: http://www.herbert-sandberg.de/bio.htm

The artist’s website explains his intentions with this manifesto:

Für viele ein veraltetes Buch mit 7 Siegeln, für einige die gelungene Kapitalismuskritik schlechthin: Das “Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei”. Sandberg, der bereits kapitalistische Lebensverhältnisse selbst miterlebt hatte, wollte mit seinen Decelithschnitten die Gedanken von Marx und Engels aus seiner ganz eigenen Sicht neu anschaulich machen.

Viele der Themen sind heute aktueller denn je. Themen wie “Bourgeoisie und Produktionsmittel”, “Rüstung und Öl” und “Die Proletarier haben nichts zu verlieren als ihre Ketten” haben sicher so manchen Wirtschaftsboss und Politiker in Weißglut gebracht.

Aber keine Angst: die Verblödung der Menschheit geht so rasch vonstatten, dass in einigen Jahren sicher keiner mehr das Buch kennt… Oder ?

Paper made from asparagus, canna lily, carrots, and more

Fred Siegenthaler, Strange Papers: A Collection of the World’s Rarest Handmade Papers (Muttenz: Fred Siegenthaler, Paper Art, 1987). Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2021- in process


There are a number of good descriptions online for Strange Papers. Here’s one: https://books-on-books.com/2021/01/10/books-on-books-collection-fred-siegenthaler/ Here is the description of our copy:

“In the early 1980s Fred Siegenthaler, a papermaker himself, wrote to international papermakers he knew from his travels requesting samples of their work made from rare and unusual materials. From these he chose 101 papers from 51 papermakers and purchased 200 sheets of each to produce this limited edition box set of samples with accompanying book. Papers in this collection come from makers in The Netherlands, Mexico, USA, Denmark, Brazil, Philippines, Germany, Israel, Australia, Japan, Switzerland, Scotland, Belgium, Egypt, England, and Czechoslovakia, and are made from materials including asparagus, canna lily, carrots, cedar bark, corn husks, kangaroo grass, hemp, laver, leather, pampas grass, papyrus, petmoss, potato stalks, red hot poker, suksuka, stinging nettle, and other exotic ingredients. The work is limited to 200 copies, the first 20 of which comprise the special edition with an additional 19 samples. This copy is one of the regular edition and is numbered 104 of 200 and signed by the author.”

Fred Siegenthaler is the founder of The International Association of Hand Papermakers and Paper Artists (IAPMA), the world’s leading organization for paper artists. It was founded in 1986 in Düren, Germany, when paper as an art medium was far less well-known than it is today. While paper history and production are one facet of the Association’s activities, the central focus is the role of paper as art form and contemporary artistic medium.

The next IAPMA congress takes place from October 7-10, 2021, in Tokyo Japan: https://iapma.info/Congresses

Siegenthaler is also the author of several dozen volumes, articles, and conference papers including Bücher für Kunsterziehung; Agamemnon 3; Tsai-Lun: vesuche in der Kunst Papiermachens; Diverse Papier; Siebdruck-Papiere =Papier de l’impression au cadre; and Künstlerbriefe.

 

Wifredo Lam

By the 1950s, Surrealism had run its course in New York and Berlin. In Paris, short-lived magazines such as Medium; Le Surréalisme, Même; and Bief continued to promote the work of Breton, Péret, Lam, Masson, Tanguy, Leonore Carrington and others.

Two small fine-press poetry volumes were published in 1958 under the Paris imprint Méconnaissance (Misunderstanding), presumably hoping to continue but finding these luxury publications too costly. The first was Ce château pressenti with poetry by Ghérasim Luca (1913-1994) and a frontispiece print by Victor Brauner (1903-1966). The second was La Rose et la Cétoine; La Nacre et le Noir, with poetry by Claude Tarnaud (1922-1991) and a frontispiece etching by Wifredo Lam (1902–1982).

The Graphic Arts Collection is fortunate to have added this publication, uncut, and with a hand colored etching by Lam.
Claude Tarnaud and Wifredo Lam, La Rose et la Cétoine. La Nacre et le Noir (Paris, Méconnaissance, 1958). Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2021- in process

A Hepster’s Dictionary

–Music & Lyrics by Al Sherman & Harry Tobias from the film Sensations of 1945.

Cab Calloway (1907-1994 ). The New Cab Calloway’s Cat-ologue: A Hepster’s Dictionary. 2nd revised ed.  ([New York?]: Privately published by the author, 1939). Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2021- in process

 

The first Black American musician to sell a million records from a single song, Cab Calloway (1907-1994) was also the first to write a dictionary. Working with his manager, Irvin Mills, Calloway recorded the unique lexicon he and his fellow musicians had developed and published it in June 1938 as Cab Calloway’s Cat-ologue: a Hepster’s Dictionary. It was so successful a second revised edition was published the following year as The New Cab Calloway’s Cat-ologue, with a foreword by Ned E. Williams (managing editor of Downbeat magazine). Seven more editions followed through 1944.

Calloway’s foreword to the 1944 volume began: “Some six years ago I compiled the first glossary of words, expressions, and the general patois employed by musicians and entertainers in New York’s teeming Harlem. That the general public agreed with me is amply evidenced by the fact that the present issue is the sixth edition since 1938 and is the official jive language reference book of the New York Public Library. … Many [words] first saw the light of printer’s ink in Billy Rowe’s widely read column “The Notebook,” in the Pittsburgh Courier.”

He wasn’t kidding. According to the New York Daily News, June 3, 1944, “The New York Public Library announces that it will use Cab Calloway’s Hepsters’ Dictionary as the official jive reference book…”

This wonderful radio program from the BBC will tell you everything: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/b04mcmnl

 

Armstrongs are the musical notes in the upper register and friskin’ the whiskers means the musicians are warming up. A barbecue is a girl friend and if you need a match you would say, Boot me that match.”

[Newark, Ohio] 17 June 1938: 4.

 

 

Calloway and his orchestra played at Princeton many times, but he never left a copy of his dictionary.

 

Minneapolis Tribune 18 June 1944: 32.

 

 

Julio Plaza and Augusto de Campos

Julio Plaza (1938-2003), Objetos Serigrafias Originais; Augusto de Campos Poema (São Paulo: Julio Pacello, 1968-69). Illustrated book with poem and ten cut-and-folded screen prints. Copy VI of 30 ex. FC (outside the trade). Graphic Arts Collection GAX 2021-in process

 

In the late 1960s, the Brazilian artist Julio Plaza began experimenting with cut and folded paper. “There was the idea of breaking with plastic form and advancing into space,” he remembered. Various models were developed working on stiff white paper, which would eventually be screen printed in bright primary colors.

Augusto de Campos was brought in to write a critical essay as the forward to whatever this book project was going to be but instead, he chose to write concrete poetry integrated into Plaza’s moving shapes. Published as Objetos, these were in fact the first poemóbiles. Plaza and de Campos continued to work on various projects throughout the 1970s and 1980s, including Caixa Preta and many editions of Poemóbiles.

 

 

 

The pages of Objetos are folded and placed inside a colorful slipcase, allowing for the exhibition of individual sheets alone or in multi-layer groups. Although they are usually photographed as perfectly symmetrical geometric forms, they can be seen at a variety of stages of opening or closing, from a variety of angles.

Other projects in paper architecture include Abracadabra by Werner Pfeiffer, Dieter Roth’s Book AC 1958-1964 and various projects by the Dutch graphic artist and resistance fighter Hendrik Nicolaas Werkman, all available in the Graphic Arts Collection at Princeton.