The Early Illuminated Books (The Illuminated Books of William Blake, Volume 3)
Category: Books,Arts & Photography,Graphic Design
The Early Illuminated Books (The Illuminated Books of William Blake, Volume 3) Details
Review "[Blake's] illuminated books, parables of earthly life, were peopled with fanciful creatures drawn from an elaborate invented mythology. Blake published these works himself, but his ambition to reach a wide audience was never realized. Now the William Blake Trust, in association with Princeton University Press, has initiated a five-volume facsimile series. . . . The first two volumes . . . are now available. Produced with meticulous care, each has a brief introduction. Each volume also contains exquisite reproductions of the original plates, a new transcription of Blake's text and scholarly but accessible plate-by-plate commentaries."---Andrea Barnet, The New York Times Book Review"[These volumes] reproduce, plate by plate, Blake's hand-lettered verses and colored illustrations. . . . These illuminated books, masterpieces of the book-maker's art, answer critical questions, especially about the poet's late, recondite allegories. They remind the poetry scholar that his Blake was first a visual artist, indebted to Raphael and Michelangelo, and second a writer beholden to Spenser and Milton." (New Criterion)"In every way this initial release is a triumph. The exquisite images and a lucid text of each volume endow not just Blake's work, but the relationships between word and image, with a crystalline clarity."---Eric Gibson, The Washington Times"The color printing is exceptional."---Lewis Segal, The Los Angeles Times Book Review Read more About the Author David Bindman is Durning-Lawrence Professor of the History of Art at University College, London. Morris Eaves, Robert N. Essick, and Joseph Viscomi are Professors of English at, respectively, University of Rochester, University of California at Riverside, and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Read more
Reviews
great