CRANACH PRESSE.


CRAIG, EDWARD GORDON. 1872-1966; GILL, ERIC. 1882-1940; JOHNSTON, EDWARD. 1872-1944. Hamlet. Die tragische Geschichte von Hamlet Prinzen von Daenemark in deutscher Sprache. Weimar: Die Cranach Presse, 1929. Folio (352 x 240 mm). 74 woodcut illustrations by and after Edward Gordon Craig, half-title and title printed in red and black from type by Eric Gill, typeface designed by Edward Johnston. Ancillary texts in English, French, German and Latin printed in the margins. Vellum-backed boards, publisher's plain paper jacket. "...THE BRAVEST ADVENTURE AMONG ALL PRIVATE PRESS BOOKS ... THIS BOOK IS A FLAWLESS MONUMENT" (Franklin The Private Presses p 164). A monument 17 years in the making, Count Harry Kessler's Cranach Hamlet began with a proposed stage production of Gordon-Craig, from which Kessler agreed to do a lavish book in 1912. Working through the first World War and through the 1920s, Gordon Craig designed the woodcuts, cutting them himself, and master craftsman Edward Johnston designed the typeface "after that used by Fust and Schoeffer in their Mainz Psalter of 1457, it was cut by Edward Prince and completed after his death by G.T. Friend" (Franklin). "Anybody who examines the Cranach Press Hamlet must agree it is worthy of its reputation. The paper, superficially like Bachelor's Kelmscott, seems softer and more friendly, appropriate for the expressionist style of Craig's woodcuts. It is an expressionist book ... Sometimes the woodcuts appear like suggestions for sets and costume. Sometimes they enter the page in a kind of stage setting of type, as the sources for Shakespeare make their way round the edges of the type area as a frame for the text. Red headlines and captions relieve the the severity of vision. The wood grain, the shadows from varied depths of engraving, bring valuable informality to a formidable scheme" (Franklin). Artist and the Book 66; Ray England p 177.