Monday 30 July 2012

Jiffy Bag Watch 3

This one comes a little late as work and family commitments have had to take priority.
However, I received another delivery and I am beginning to think that my choice.of title may have been a little.premature as yet another cardboard mailer surrounded todays aquisition.
However, the volume that is contained was The Fruits of Solitude by William Penn.


Hardcover, bound in orange cloth, this is another volume from the Everyman Library (#724) this time from 1942. The binding is a little loose, the spine is a bi faded and there is some foxing and discolouration to the pages, particuylarly on the end-papers.  Without the elaborate end-papers present in the Woolman volume and a spine absent of decoration, this edition is noticeably more austere.  The reason for this,I am intreagued to learn, is indicated by the presence of a symbol printed beneath the publishers details.


As this edition of the text was published during World War 2, the printers were obligated to print the book conforming to a given set of standards, presumably governing typeface size, margin sizes, white-space etc.
A cursory search for more information has led me to conclude that, ironically enough, such a standard appears to be little documented.

As for William Penn, well a brief biography printed in this edition readsL

'WILLIAM PENN, born in 1644, the son of an admiral.  Sent down from Christ College, Oxford, for nonconformity.  Became a Quaker in 1667.  In 1682 sailed to America and founded a Quaker colony.  From then until his death in 1718 he lived in Pennsylvania and England.'
I actually recall William Penn making a brief appearance in Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography.  I am intreagued as to how Penn's story will interract with Franklin's.

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