Description
Henry Altemus Company, Published 1909. Hardcover, 92 pp.; 16 cm; 6 black-and-white plates; pale green Art Nouveau decorative borders throughout; ornamental endpapers.
Rare, out-of-print & unusual books · Since 1997
110
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Catalog notes
Condition & notes
In Good condition, no dust jacket. Tan cloth boards with illustrated cover in red and black depicting three men at a banquet table with lobster ornaments at the base; boards show moderate rubbing and edge wear; cloth chipping and splitting at spine hinges and at head and tail of spine; thin crack between pp. 80-81 but binding is still sound. Interior pages mildly toned at edges but otherwise unmarked with some scattered light spotting; black-and-white sketch illustrations. Ornamental green spider web endpapers with spider and fly motif. A satirical portrait of "that great American institution the banquet," by Samuel G. Blythe (1868-1947), one of the most widely-read humorists and political journalists of the Progressive Era, who contributed more than 180 articles to The Saturday Evening Post between 1909 and 1922. A recognizable parade of types -- the rambling toastmaster, the pompous judge, the windbag colonel, the self-important senator -- is rendered in lively, deadpan narrative prose that captures a specific and now-vanished stratum of American social life. Published in the same year Blythe began his prolific association with the Post, this is an upscale Altemus gift book production at the height of the Art Nouveau period, with black-and-white sketch plates and ornamental borders throughout.