Regarding Bookplates I

Regarding Bookplates

By

Ralph Fletcher Seymour

It is a pleasant experience, on opening a book, to find a bookplate on the inside cover. On such an occasion the discoverer is predisposed in their favor, as he holds in his eager hands a book, a veritable mirror of life, and the label is in its way a more or less bright mirror of the owner’s life. Bookplates are, in this way, a pleasant episode, much like a lovely landscape seen in the course of a long trip, and remain a half defined but pleasant help to the business of living thru the day.

It has become the custom to elaborate a simple label by enriching the design with items expressive of the taste, personality or fancy of the owner. This procedure should make a more beautiful and desirable thing out of a plain and serviceable label. It, first of all, should set forth the owner’s name, perhaps his residence, and may serve to inform the observer of the profession, avocation or special interests of the possessor, thus becoming a contribution to the book in which they appear. Realizing so glorious a destiny is not one of the smallest of achievements for few things which crows into the pages of a book actually have earned so fair a distinction, but bookplates have been used for hundreds of years and, like old wine and old friends, have arrived at a spiritual development both precious and rare.

At the time of their origin they, in a measure, filled the place of those painted and carved covers or bindings which bore the coat of arms, initials, or other emblem of the owner. They became a feature in books when printing became the handmaid of democracy and books were no longer written by scribes in exclusive scriptoriums for rich churches or for great nobles. The earliest known bookplate came from Germany. It is a woodcut of a hedgehog among flowers possibly the author’s playful picturegraph of himself among his books. All the early ones were either etched on copper or cut in wood and, printed on paper, were pasted on the first page of books or on the inside front cover if the books were in permanent bindings. At that date they were mostly armorial designs the “Ex Libris” did not appear nor that matter did the name of the owner often show.

Germany, France and England in manner typical of their natures, developed their own design in bookplates. A hundred years or so ago they were all engraved or etched and there are periods in their development as there are styles of architecture, ships, and armorials. I could never feel more than a weak enthusiasm for the typical engraved armorial bookplate: the idea of personality lost in the family, which these plates presented, gave a minimum of hope to the creative artist, although there are occasional fine plates such as George W. Eve used to design, dignified and well proportioned, with finely handled shields, mantling, ribbons and lettering.

Regarding Bookplates II

All sorts of material is serviceable for the factual part of bookplates. Entrance gates, houses, fireplaces, libraries, whimsical or literary ideas, fishing or hunting, golf, sailing, not to mention armorial, typographical and other styles, all are motifs that serve as material on which to base a bookplate design. In fact it seems to be of little importance what the subject may be and of much importance how it is used. The most significant development in bookplates has been the markedly finer quality of the art and design evident in modern work. At the commencement of their history and now again, having passed through a long period of mediocrity, typical bookplates are excellent in design and require first rate and creative artists to design them.

It is desirable that well designed bookplates accentuate the manner in which they have been reproduced, whether woodcut, line engraving, halftone or collotype, and the more nearly this method is expressive of the craft to typography the more proper is the mechanical part of the print. Perhaps the least used method at present and perhaps the best is the woodcut, when done in the very early manner and by a good craftsman. Plates, so reproduced, present the peculiarly harmonious appearance of works of art, showing the little marks of the cutting tool characteristic of the woodcut. The same may be said for the engraved or etched plate. Halftones and collotype tend to erase these marks. Line drawings, which are reproduced mechanically into zinc printing plates often are too much reduced from the original drawing to keep any character, or have too much solid black or lines too thin and stringy, and are therefore often disappointing.

Regarding Bookplates III

Bookplates are meant to appear only with printed books and should appear to have been produced under conditions similar to those under which books are made. The observance of this rule would improve the character of plates designed by first rate artists, whose plates sometimes seem to more nearly express the character of illustrations or painting than of typographical designs.

An example of a period plate is here shown in the Racquet Club label. It is interesting because in style it is accurate and there is a good balance and proportion between the animated group and the decoration.

Differing completely in plan and execution is the John Timothy Stone plate, it presents the happy hunting ground of a fisherman both of the souls of men and trout. The design is entirely naturalistic.

The Union League Club plate is a combination of picture and of decoration, and is interesting historically because it portrays periods in the development of Chicago. The Archibald Church Library Plate is a modern institutional plate in the pictorial manner superior to the usual plate of this character.

Regarding Bookplates IV

These four labels are all from copper etched plates. The bitten lines and tone secured from intaglio lines and from wiping the plate give a delicacy not otherwise obtained. Quite different in character are the two heavily drawn printed plates. That of Edna Kircher is an allegorical design and portrays the ever-recurring difficulty into which men are innocently precipitated by the eternal woman who will not leave the gnarled old Tree of Knowledge alone. Beyond in the pleasant valley lie all vanities swept by clean winds of heaven. That faithful recorder of the joys and griefs of humanity, a book, appears in the design. The woodcut plate of the turtle and shield also has a tree for its major motif. Both these plates are designed to be printed from blocks.

Beginning with the Bruce plate more than twenty five years ago, Mr. Seymour has designed a considerable number of Ex Libris labels and his studio is seldom without several in process of etching or to be made for letter press printing. It is a pleasure to thus contribute in a small degree to the bibliophilic pleasures of a few who, having yielded to the seduction of books, have then plunged more deeply into the esoteric indulgence of “getting a bookplate”.