The Book of Job courtesy of Boice Lydell

Book courtesy of Roycroft Historian Boice Lydell

The Book of Job

As Translated from the Original by Rabbi Abraham Elzas With Some Comments on the Poem by Elbert Hubbard.

The book measures 7 3/4" x 6 7/8" and has 142 pages. The text body set in Antiqua Old Style.  350 copies were printed on Whatman handmade paper and hand illuminated. The first forty copies were specially illuminated by Bertha Hubbard and the complete edition was bound in paper over boards with a cloth spine. Four copies are known to have been bound in full Levant. This is almost exactly like the one that sold at the Rago Auction on 17 May 03. We have had a few debates on whether this is a Roycroft binding or not, but I'm starting to lean torwards Roycroft now that I have seen this one.
Printing Shop."
The first ad for the Book of Job that I know of was in the July 1897 Philistine and it is really something else. "The Master of the Roycroft Printing Shop desires to make the following announcement. 1, Beginning with the Book of Job, which is now on the presses, all Roycroft books will be printed on Whatman paper. 2. The minimum price of a Roycroft book will be $5.00, net. 3. No Edition will be printed of more than three hundred copies." .... This edition of the Book of Job was 350 copies, 'nuff said. The advertised cost was $5.00 for the hand illumined edition on Whatman paper.

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