So like I mentioned in an earlier post, while I was relaxing in Muskoka, I naturally spent some time in various bookstores and libraries, just to see what the glorious north had to offer in the way of reading material. I was not disappointed.
While in the Huntsville Public Library, I found this beauty in their book sale pile:
Isn't it simply delicous? Rich and gothic and dark, and so very inviting. Published in 1934, back when Bennett Cerf was still around as one of Random House's editors. And then when I gently slipped off the cover, inside was a beautiful cloth cover design:
There is something really special about those old Modern Library books, I think. The new covers at The Modern Library web site are quite attractive, too, but they don't have that delicious old book smell, now, do they? And let's face it. They ain't as cheap as they used to be, either! On the inside flap of Seven Gothic Tales it reads:
The Modern Library puts into your house the greatest book treasures of the past and present in convenient, inexpensive form. In the Modern Library you will find many books that you have always wanted to read; books that "speak to the modern mind"; books that belong in the library of every cultured person. Many of these famous titles cost from $2 to $10 apiece in their original editions or were available previously ony in expensive sets; you can now obtain them in handy, compact volumes, beautifully printed and bound in cloth, at only a small outlay.
Geez! I wonder how much these books cost at the time of publication! Considering the fact that I paid $5 for this book at the library booksale, and thought I was getting a pretty good deal! And the expression at only a small outlay – I love it! Imagine a publisher using that phrase on a book cover these days!
And finally, here's the back of the book:
I just love the typeface used for the The Modern Libary. And can you imagine cutting up this book cover, just to get a coupon? Once again, what publisher today would do that for one of their books?
Oh, and in case you were wondering, Isak Dinesen's stories are... very interesting. Not quite what I'm used to – the writing is a bit too heavy-handed and ornate for my liking, but they are gothic tales, so what do you expect?
One last little bit of trivia about this book. I was very excited about bringing home what I thought was a new and unique title to our library collection. My husband casually looked at my book and made the remark that the title sounded very familiar, and that he was sure he had a copy of the same collection of stories somewhere in his own collection of fiction. I found this difficult to believe, because I thought the book so unique, and besides, it just didn't seem to be the kind of book that would have ever interested him. Sure enough, about an hour later the hubby triumphantly brought me a copy of his Seven Gothic Tales, which he had ordered from the Book-of-the-Month Club many years ago. His copy was published in 1961, with a new introduction by John Updike (the introduction in my edition was written by Dorothy Canfield, and quite frankly is very silly and overly emotional. Updike's intro is much better – thoughtful and insightful, and full of a lot of fascinating facts about the larger-than-life author). I asked my husband why he ordered the book, and had he actually read all the stories. He said that at the time he thought the book was going to be dark and scary, a la Poe or Lovecraft. He had never finished the stories, finding them to be a tad too girly in tone. Well. Hmmph.
Anyway, my copy of Seven Gothic Tales is waaaay better than his. So there.
