The Wormsley Library : A Personal Selection by Sir Paul Getty, K.B.E

Published for the Wormsley Library by Maggs Bros. in co-operation with The Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, London, first edition, 1999. Laminated illustrated wrappers, large 8vo, 30 cm,. xii, 278 pp. 106 entries. Catalogue of an exhibition held at The Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, 27 January-2 May 1999. From the introduction: "The books reflect some of their collector's catholic enthusiasms. Early purchases include examples of fine printing in rich array, from incunables to modern private-press books, many on vellum, English hand-coloured aquatint books, chiefly travel and scenery, the flower of French illustrated books from Verard to Vollard, and, above all, a spectacular assemblage of fine bindings from medieval times to today...There are also splendid manuscripts, tike the magnificent Gradual from the monastery of Ottobeuren, the unique pages from the life of St. Thomas Becket, repatriated from Belgium some fifteen years ago, exquisite Books of Hours from France, Flanders, and England, and works that especially delight the English like the Psalter of Queen Anne Boleyn; there is also the jewel-like Renaissance psalter, once ascribed to Giulio Clovio, which belonged to Lord Arundel and Dr. Mead and was entombed in its inlaid and painted wooden box by Horace Walpole, the delicious little volumes of Songs of Innocence and of Experience that "William Blake coloured so singularly, and Cobden-Sanderson's binding of Marx's Das Kapital for "William Morris and friends". As a collector, Sir Paul has focussed on his chosen areas with admirable discipline and thoroughness, rarely allowing himself to be seduced by works that might feel lonely on his shelves. In the field of bindings he has allowed himself greater latitude, and almost every manifestation of the bookbinder's art is there in splendid exemplars, from twelfth-century Limoges enamel, rude medieval coverings of hairy deer and greasy sheep, magnificent painted strapwork from the Renaissance, dazzling interlaces a la fanfare, glorious Restoration bindings by Mearne and Cleeve and their contemporaries, and work by all the great masters and innovators in Europe up to our own times. Slightly rubbed, otherwise Very Good.