Labour Vertue Glorie. Leaves from the Emblem Booka of Gabriel Rollenhagen (1611) and George Wither (1635). Illustrated with Diverse Comments Historic Y& Critical, assembled & annotated by Sim. Caelestibus.
Vancouver: Heavenly Monkey Press, 2018. One of forty-eight copies, done in three different formats. Series 3 is one of twenty-four copies out of a total edition of forty-eight copies. . Series 3, with a leaf from both Rollenhagen'a Nucleus Emblematum Selectissimorum and Winter's Collection of Emblemes, Ancient & Moderne. Series 1 contained four leaves, including leaves containing the same engravings from Rollenhagen and Winter; Series 2 contained a leaf from Rollenhaben paired with the same plate on a Wither leaf. With illustrations, ornaments, and decorative initials. A fine copy. Bound in cream-colored paper over boards at the HM Studio. Quarto. 63, (ii)pp. Item #16541
From the publisher, Rollin Milroy: "The focus of Labour Vertue Glorie, however, is not the content or interpretations of the two authors’ emblems, but the production and form of the books from which these sample leaves come. To that end, the book reprints three of Wither’s prefatory notes from A Collection: one about William Marshall’s engraved frontispiece, one about the game of lots included in the book, and “To The Reader” in which he discusses at length the book’s creation and intent. Each of these is appended with comments from a variety of sources, discussing and sometimes disputing the author’s words. The comments also provide some insights to how Wither adopted, and more importantly adapted, Rollenhagen’s original work for his own purposes. While not exact facsimiles, the reprinted texts follow the original’s use of swash characters and seemingly random combinations of roman, italic, and majuscule types. But only the reprinted texts; the rest of the book is set in a more traditional, and calming, manner..."
Price: $1,000.00