DOI Heft:
No. 36 (March, 1896)
DOI Artikel:White, Gleeson: Some recent book-plates
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.17296#0109
Some Recent Book-Plates
hour-glasses, skulls, owls, and reading-lamps, not quite so clear. No doubt some personal mean-
Surely the fact that you care enough for your books ing is intended which does not reveal itself to an
to provide a special label for them, so that they outside critic.
shall not be disfigured with hand-writing, is in itself The fine composition by George R. Quested,
proof that you are a book-lover. for Dr. John Paul Malecki, is a capital instance
It would seem as if the book-plate were made to of a pictorial plate, so broadly schemed that it
do for the living to-day what the fulsome epitaph loses the mere picture and gains a certain monu-
did for the departed in the last century. A person mental effect. In a smaller size it would fulfil its
must be of very undecided tastes and individuality purpose still more admirably, and deserves to be
if he needs the facts to be recorded on his book- reproduced by the new Swan line Etching process,
plate, lest he (or she) should forget them. If their whereby impressions from an intaglio plate would
glorifications of personal hobbies are intended for give it the richness of an old copperplate frontis-
strangers, the poster offers more field. And instead piece, which its composition and scheme suggest,
of planning of book-labels (mostly hidden) a house Two, untitled, by A. Maude, are a little over-
label, stuck by the front door, would give more elaborate in detail, possibly a trifle too pictorial
space for this superfluous babble and spread the to be exactly fitted for repeated use, but all the
unimportant information over a wider area. same they are not unworthy examples of their
But it is easy to construct a theory
of the ideal book-plate and much
less easy to carry it out. Only,
whatever it be—it is evidently more
interesting if it escape the obvious.
Now a figure of a girl reading a
book is patently the most obvious
of all obvious themes for an ex-
libris, especially one intended for a
lady's book-plate. Therefore it is
best left alone: and this protest
conveys no hidden sneer at any par-
ticular designer—for who that has
designed book-plates could declare
truthfully that he (or she) had never
used this painfully common-place
motive.
Yet even this theme can be so
poetically treated that you forget its
too frequent precedents. The de-
sign for Joshua Sing is one of Mr.
Bell's most characteristic composi-
tions. Often as he has treated
idealised figures of Poetry and Prose
before, one may doubt if he has ever
accomplished a more graceful de-
sign. That for the Hon. Mary F.
H. Borthwick is redolent of the
woods and fields and of the joyous-
ness of youth, while another, for
Philip JP. Rathbone, shown here in
the smaller of its two sizes, is a
quite notable example. In its
general plan the best of the three
as a label, it is no less beautiful in
the sweep of its line; the connec-
tion of the theme with its purpose is book-plate by r. anning bell
96
O/ HVA. / INC;
hour-glasses, skulls, owls, and reading-lamps, not quite so clear. No doubt some personal mean-
Surely the fact that you care enough for your books ing is intended which does not reveal itself to an
to provide a special label for them, so that they outside critic.
shall not be disfigured with hand-writing, is in itself The fine composition by George R. Quested,
proof that you are a book-lover. for Dr. John Paul Malecki, is a capital instance
It would seem as if the book-plate were made to of a pictorial plate, so broadly schemed that it
do for the living to-day what the fulsome epitaph loses the mere picture and gains a certain monu-
did for the departed in the last century. A person mental effect. In a smaller size it would fulfil its
must be of very undecided tastes and individuality purpose still more admirably, and deserves to be
if he needs the facts to be recorded on his book- reproduced by the new Swan line Etching process,
plate, lest he (or she) should forget them. If their whereby impressions from an intaglio plate would
glorifications of personal hobbies are intended for give it the richness of an old copperplate frontis-
strangers, the poster offers more field. And instead piece, which its composition and scheme suggest,
of planning of book-labels (mostly hidden) a house Two, untitled, by A. Maude, are a little over-
label, stuck by the front door, would give more elaborate in detail, possibly a trifle too pictorial
space for this superfluous babble and spread the to be exactly fitted for repeated use, but all the
unimportant information over a wider area. same they are not unworthy examples of their
But it is easy to construct a theory
of the ideal book-plate and much
less easy to carry it out. Only,
whatever it be—it is evidently more
interesting if it escape the obvious.
Now a figure of a girl reading a
book is patently the most obvious
of all obvious themes for an ex-
libris, especially one intended for a
lady's book-plate. Therefore it is
best left alone: and this protest
conveys no hidden sneer at any par-
ticular designer—for who that has
designed book-plates could declare
truthfully that he (or she) had never
used this painfully common-place
motive.
Yet even this theme can be so
poetically treated that you forget its
too frequent precedents. The de-
sign for Joshua Sing is one of Mr.
Bell's most characteristic composi-
tions. Often as he has treated
idealised figures of Poetry and Prose
before, one may doubt if he has ever
accomplished a more graceful de-
sign. That for the Hon. Mary F.
H. Borthwick is redolent of the
woods and fields and of the joyous-
ness of youth, while another, for
Philip JP. Rathbone, shown here in
the smaller of its two sizes, is a
quite notable example. In its
general plan the best of the three
as a label, it is no less beautiful in
the sweep of its line; the connec-
tion of the theme with its purpose is book-plate by r. anning bell
96
O/ HVA. / INC;