Color On Every Page

Lewis and Dorothy Allen believed that fine books should have some color on every page, and their dedication to this concept is one reason I like their books so much. As I was looking through some of my LECs the other week, I realized that many of my favorites are indeed the volumes that have some form of color (whether decoration or type) on nearly every page - such as The Birds, or Sonnets from The Portuguese, or even Tristan and Iseult.

Besides the Valenti Angelo books where the whole page is basically a giant decoration (Psalms/Proverbs/Kasidah/Koran/Vathek etc), can anyone help me brainstorm other LEC offerings where color was used throughout, rather than just for the title page and illustrations?

The Quarto-Millenary. :)

The stunning The Golden Cockerel comes immediately to mind, and Undine. Marian Parry provided delightful decorative illustrations on every page of The Birds and over half are in color. Both The Oresteia and The Argonautica have the title in sanguine on every page with the text in black. There must be others.

And let us not forget the LEC's little brother! The Heritage Press can boast color on every page of The Sonnets of William Shakespeare, one of Valenti Angelo's finest books; Sylvain Sauvage's Romeo and Juliet, and A Shropshire Lad decorated by Edward A Wilson.

As well as the inside job he did on the LEC Kasidah, Angelo was I assume also responsible for its decorated gold slipcase. The case is remarkably sturdy, too - though the credit for that presumably belongs to George Macy.

Ovid - The Art of Love and The Argonautica

>4 featherwate:

featherwate, the HP Shakespeare's Sonnets is truly a masterpiece--I consider it on a par with anything the LEC did for beauty of design and execution.

The wonderful HP edition of The Book of Job, in addition to Szyk's illustrations, has colored uncials at the head of every chapter, which means the majority of the pages have color (the LEC I'm sure does as well, but I don't own it. The LEC Book of Ecclesiastes has color on very page.

Thanks everyone. This is fantastic. Argonautica is on its way, and I already had The Art of Love and The Oresteia.

I will check out Sonnets.

Another is Persuasion. Blue title and chapter along the bottom.

One of my favorite post-Macy jobs: The Circus of Dr. Lao. A plethora of illustrations and decorations and the page numbers in ochre.

Speaking of color, I was in a bookstore the other day that happened to have the LEC, the HP, and the Nonesuch editions of A Woman's Life. It was very interesting to see how the coloring of the illustrations varied between the three editions. The LEC won for richness and depth of color; I would rank them LEC, Nonesuch, then HP. I have a few other of the HP and Nonesuch French novels and remember that I preferred the Nonesuch edition over the HP for those as well when they were both present to choose from. But this is the first time a LEC was also there for comparison. I should have snapped some photos, even if it was just with my iPhone...

jveezer, I recently found a LEC copy of, co-incidentally, De Maupassant's Tales for a very reasonable price. I have had the HP edition for many, many years, and it was interesting to see there was virtually no difference between the illustrations in both editions (watercolors by Gunther Böhmer). Usually, the LEC wins out over the HP counterpart, but there are many instances where my eye could discern no difference in quality.

Also interesting is the fact that the LEC edition of A Woman's Life was issued ten years after the Nonesuch original (one of the Ten Great French Romances). I have the Nonesuch original as well as the later LEC, and now I'm curious to compare the two, for my Nonesuch version states on the colophon that Legrand's lithographs were "hand-coloured in the studio of Charlize Brakely" whereas for the LEC edition, Legrand's "pen and dry brush illustrations were reproduced as gravures and hand colored in the studio of Walter Fischer." My Nonesuch copy is in storage so it will be a while before I can get to it, but I will try to take side-by-side photographs for comparison purposes.

Looks like the Shaving of Shagpat has color on every page. The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan is likely in the same league.

>12 BuzzBuzzard:

Right, vdanchev--I had forgotten about those.

Hajji Baba also has the sturdiest, most sumptuous, velour-lined slipcase on any pre-Shiff era LEC I've seen (to protect the amazing front and rear boards). This might rank as another of the "invisible" LECs.

Many of J. I. Rodale's enterprising Illustrated Story Classics have colour on every page - running headers, marginalia, decorations, page numbers. Coloured uncials, too.

Color on every page works,in some cases, but not in all. My sumptuously rebound Red Badge of Courage has only black type on each text page, but the magnificent illustrations by John Steuart Curry permit the absence of color to be unoticable.

Just discovered this thread. I’ve been reading Droll Stories and appreciate the color on every page, which contrasts with the stories which are certainly off-color.

Sorry

The LEC Chronicle of the Cid, aka El Cid, has red initials on every page. Looks grand, it does.

The 1943 Erasmus has color on almost every page, and the vermilion marginalia are Lynd Ward's remarkable little personifications of Folly. This is one of my very favorite LECs. Stunning.

Valenti Angelo and his LECs have already been noted, but other works which feature his color illuminations on every page are: the HP Salome, and the HP The Song of Songs Which is Solomon's.

An interesting anomaly is the first HP issue of Poe's Tales of Mystery and Imagination, which has page number, story title and the captions for the illustrations in vermilion on every page--but the LEC Tales does not! As I remember, the 2nd HP of this title also featured color on each page, but as I gave that away long ago, I hate to trust my memory any more. I'm sure Jerry (WildcatJF) can confirm that.

I suppose the double column Dumas novels should also count.

I'm late to the party, but . . .

Ah, Wilderness! has color on every page. From the Sandglass: "The running heads on each page are intended to resemble little marquees proclaiming the play and its author."

Running throughout the book, Fourth-of-July "fireworks form the chief decorative motif. . . . They are suggested by the sprays of red and blue stars."

It's one of the most charming books I own.