The Eve of St. Agnes and The Deserted Village

These two slim, vellum bound volumes are part of a series of fourteen poems that C.R. Ashbee handpicked to be printed at the Essex House Press. Each has a hand-coloured wood engraving frontispiece and decorated initials, the products of a labour intensive process that would have been impossible for a larger volume. A number of artists assisted with the project, many of them children’s book illustrators, and as such the drawings reflect trends in contemporary book illustration.  It is the vellum bindings, however, that render these small books unique in the context of this exhibition, stamped with a flower and the motto ‘Soul is Form’. This evocative line from Spenser’s An Hymn in Honor of Beauty – “for soul is form and doth the body make” – encapsulates the Arts and Crafts concept that the best craftsmanship is informed by the thriving soul of an inspired craftsman. Less than 150 copies of each poem were printed and they were quite expensive, costing up to 3 guineas, which was as much as Essex House’s larger books on paper.