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The First American Sex Manual
by Stephen J. GertzFirst American edition, London [Boston]: 1766.It's not a Kama Sutra for the Colonies; coital postures are nowhere to be found nor Vedic wisdom on "sucking a mango fruit." Nor is it...
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The Misery of Edwin Drood: Bad Typography in the Movies
by Alastair JohnstonOnce at the Monotype Conference in Cambridge I happened to sit at dinner next to the man whose job was to fabricate period typography at the BBC, and I told him how I envied his...
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Two Doves Bindings To Drool Over
by Stephen J. GertzTwo Doves Press books bound at the Doves Bindery recently passed through my hands. In a swoon, I almost passed out."In 1893, when T.J. Cobden-Sanderson decided to give up bookbinding...
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Magnificent 17th Century Maps To The Stars' Homes
by Stephen J. Gertz Unidentified Los Angeles rare book dealer offering celestial maps.Here in Los Angeles you can't throw a rock without hitting a star. They're all over the place, a galaxy of...
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A Bonet Lion Binding That Roars
by Stephen J. GertzThis majestically leonine binding wrought by Paul Bonet [1889-1971] in 1969 for a copy of the 1937 Raoul Dufy-illustrated edition of Daudet's Les Aventures prodigieuses de Tartarin...
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The Wages Of Sin: $80,000 For Rare Fanny Hill
by Stephen J. GertzFanny Hill must be thrilled. After plying her trade with varying degrees of success she now commands $54,000-$80,000 to spend an intimate evening with her. Reading a scarce, true...
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Getting Nowhere with John Cage: A Zen Biography
by Alastair JohnstonWhere the Heart Beats: John Cage, Zen Buddhism, and the Inner Life of Artists by Kay Larson. The Penguin Press, New York, 2012. 496 pp., $30.As a teenager I was interested in all...
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The Man In The Iron Mask Schleps 'Round The World
by Stephen J. Gertz"Who was that masked man?""I don't know but I wanted to thank him."On New Years Day, 1908, Harry Bensley (1876-1956), a well-to-do lone ranger involved in a £21,000 wager that he...
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The Most Unfortunately Titled Novel Ever Published In English
by Stephen J. Gertz“They’re not flamingoes, Adrian thought; there wouldn’t be flamingoes on Dildo Cay in September.” "A very unusual book, with a puzzling quality, an indefinable fascination and some...
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Common Prayers, Uncommon Binding
by Stephen J. GertzThis stunning, c. 1853, binding by Hayday of London of an 1840 edition of The Book of Common Prayer is in full brown smooth-grained Turkey morocco over beveled boards, with a single...
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A Checklist of Matrix Press (London 1961-4)
by Alastair JohnstonTom Raworth Printing Bibliography Part I Two hundred years ago when people were reading Shenstone, Bloomfield, Cowper and Collins (I am sure you know their works by heart),...
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Beware Of Jewish Doctors, 1937 Edition
by Stephen J. GertzThe American Medical Association and the editor of The Journal of the American Medical Association come under attack in this thinly-veiled anti-Semitic rant in the form of a...
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Politics, Astrology, And The Weather: A Guide To The 2012 Election
by Stephen J. GertzBecause of its topical nature, Booktryst revisits a book we first took a look at in 2010, here with an updated slant. Action in the sky = Politics on the ground.Frontispiece to...
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Women are Children: Don't Let Them Vote
by Stephen J. Gertz"The Militant" by G.T. (?), c. 1910-1912.This political cartoon, in ink and watercolor, was likely inspired by and in sympathy with the Women's National Anti-Suffrage League...
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William Blake Meets Batman
by Stephen J. GertzGarden of Love by Delphi Basilicato. In 2007, Letterpress II students at the Center for Book Arts in New York, under the direction of master printer Barbara Henry, produced Songs, a...
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A Checklist Of Goliard Press (London 1965–7)
by Alastair JohnstonTom Raworth Working Bibliography Part II. Tom Raworth by Barry Flanagan (from ACT, Trigram Press, 1973)If Matrix Press can be considered Raworth's incunabular period, the...
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Kate Greenaway Talks Almanack Layout
by Stephen J. GertzSometime in late 1891, Kate Greenaway wrote the following note to her printer/publisher, Edmund Evans. Dear Mr EvansI think it will be best to fill the months oblong with colour. I...
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The Wind Cries Mary In 1650
by Stephen J. Gertz Tabula Anemographica seu Pyxis Nautica Ventorum Nomina Sex Linguis Repraesentans.After all the jacks are in their boxes,and the clowns have all gone to bed,you can hear happiness...
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The Only Bookplate Designed By René Lalique
by Stephen J. GertzFound in a copy of the Kelmscott Press's The Defence of Guenevere and Other Poems by William Morris (1892) from the collection of Emilie B. Grigsby (1879-1964), this is the only...
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The LSD Library Goes To Harvard
by Stephen J. GertzFABRICE, Delphi. L'Opium A Paris.Paris: La Renaissance Du Livre, 1907.The Ludlow-Santo Domingo (LSD) Library of rare books, the world's first, largest, and most distinguished...
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