MotWT Algernon Blackwood deluxe
Algernon Blackwood
Centipede Press
Author signature
N
List Price
$1,000
Publication year
Limitation
2006
200
Artist
Introduction
Clarence John Laughlin
N
Median Market Value
Recorded Sales
No Data
0
14.a Deluxe Roman Numeral Edition – Leather – details unknown, traycased: 22 – $1000 (Red roman numerals)
14.b.i Clothbound with what appears to be black Japanese silk cloth, silver foil spine stamp, fully pictorial printed front board, lavender tissue paper overlay, missing limitation page, darker blue slipcase; unknown number of 300/500 total (more likely 300) – $250
14.b.ii Clothbound with what appears to be black Japanese silk cloth on the spine and textured blue cloth on the boards, slightly taller, silver foil spine stamp, blue tissue paper overlay, limitation page type 1, slightly lighter blue slipcase; unknown number of 300/500 total (more likely 300) – $250
14.b.iii Clothbound with different black cloth and pictorial inset on front board, slightly taller, gold foil spine stamp, metallic tissue paper overlay, limitation page type 2, black slipcase; unknown number of 300/500 total (more likely 300) – $250
14.b.iv Clothbound with different blue cloth and pictorial inset on front board, unknown height, unknown (possible no) spine stamp, unknown tissue paper overlay, unknown limitation page type ; unknown number of 300/500 total (more likely 300) – $250
Published as Centipede Press; 2006
Original price: $1000/$250
This book is the first release after the Circle Series, and also the first release of the long-lived Masters of the Weird Tale series, which makes it doubly interesting.
It is also the first book that not only has two separate editions (deluxe and standard), but has multiple states within an edition. We’re now starting to enter my favorite era in the press, where there was a lot of experimentation with materials, stamping, sizing, and more. What’s especially interesting, and what this first book shows ample evidence of, is that a lot of that experimentation occurred within the same release.
There are at least four different states of the standard edition of this book!
There are at least three different slipcases, two different types of black cloth used, two different types of blue cloth used, several variants of a piece of art on the front board, at least two different types of endpapers, at least three different types of tissue paper covering the title page, and at least two different types of limitation page (and one version with no limitation page).
The spines. It’s a little hard to tell, but you can kind of see the difference in texture on the right-most book, which has a different kind of black cloth binding. It’s also gold foil stamped instead of silver
The tops of the slipcases, so you can see the slightly different colors
The front covers together in 1 of the pictures, three versions on a theme. And the fourth version in a separate picture. Blue with an inset picture and it looks like a blank inset above it. One of the pictures is a mockup, I believe, so I’m not sure if there is a fifth state that includes something in the blank inset and potentially a blank spine, or if it’s just a mockup of the fourth version, which was not produced exactly as mocked-up. I think (hope) it’s the former and there are only four copies, and thus only one more for me to acquire, but I can’t count the number of times that I thought I had all the states of a book only to hear or see about another…
Nothing too exciting for the endpapers; two plain black and one plain white. Lavender tissue, blue tissue and metallic tissue in different variants. The photo of Blackwood is printed on white paper, and you can also see a slightly different title page that omits the reference to the Lee Brown Coye illustrations (which are still present ofcourse). As you can see in the gallery there are differences in the limitation pages too:
The last page of variant 1 with no limitation page!
The limitation page of variant 2, pretty sparse and listing 300 as the print run
The limitation page of variant 3, with more detail on the materials, and claiming 522 copies (500 standard and 22 deluxe). My best guess is that the 300 standard copy limitation was correct, making the true limitation 322. I say this because I’ve found that on instances when I’m able to confirm a print run, it’s usually the lower of the numbers I have available.
Bibliography by Timothy Booksker. Adapted with permission from thedarktower.org
Synopsis from the Centipede Press website
Also see Standard edition