Marbled Monday
This Marbled Monday our marbling has an unsettling vibe. This green, yellow, black, and red marbling with little gold flecks adorns the cover of The Maides Tragedy by English dramatist Francis Beaumont (1584-1616) and John Fletcher (1579-1625) with wood engravings by Scottish artist Freda Bone (1905-1991) which we shared in a previous post. The book was printed in 1932 for Cheshire House in an edition of 1200 copies, but the play was originally published in 1619.
Frankly, I find this marbling somewhat unpleasant and it gives me a swampy feeling—I’m thinking the boiling lake that Grendel lives in/under from Beowulf. It is closest to either a Schrottel or Shell pattern, but appears to have been swirled a bit at the end of the process creating this uniquely stylized pattern.
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-- Alice, Special Collections Department Manager