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159
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KHAYYAM, Omar (1048–1131); VEDDER, Elihu (1836–1923), illust…
See original version (Italian)
159
-
KHAYYAM, Omar (1048–1131); VEDDER, Elihu (1836–1923), illust…
See original version (Italian)
Estimate €400 - €600
Voluntary lot
Description
KHAYYAM, Omar (1048–1131); VEDDER, Elihu (1836–1923), illustrator. The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam: The Astronomer-Poet of Persia. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1884.
The first trade edition of the celebrated Rubáiyát, illustrated by Elihu Vedder, regarded as one of the masterpieces of late nineteenth-century American book production. Edward FitzGerald’s celebrated English translation, which played a decisive role in establishing the reputation of the Persian poet Omar Khayyám in the West, is here accompanied by one of its most accomplished pictorial interpretations, conceived by Vedder as a coherent Symbolist cycle exploring the themes of fate, time, the transience of life, and the pursuit of knowledge. An American-trained painter who was deeply immersed in the artistic milieu of Rome, Vedder developed a highly distinctive visual language influenced by Symbolism and the Pre-Raphaelites. For this work, he produced fifty-six plates, reproduced using the Lewis Photo-Type process, which rank among the finest achievements of nineteenth-century American book illustration.
Folio (400 × 325 mm). Title page, printer’s mark, dedication leaf and 56 black-and-white plates by Elihu Vedder, reproduced using phototype and photolithographic processes. Original publisher’s brown cloth, richly decorated with gilt and blind embossing to a design by Vedder himself (minor defects). (1)
See original version (Italian)
Auto-translation. Refer to original language for legal validity.
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