Three Books about Greek Mythology and Greek Poetry, 1899-1934. 

Size: (largest) 9 1/8 X 6 3/8 X 1 in. 

These three books are about Greek mythology and Greek poetry. The first book is titled Birds and Beasts of the Greek Anthology by Norman Douglas, a limited and numbered first edition about the role of animals and beasts in Greek mythology, the second book is titled Beasts and Saints, translated by Helen Waddell, and the third book is Anacreon, a book of ancient Greek poetry.  

George Norman Douglas (1868-1952) was a controversial figure. Born in Austria to a Scottish father and a Scottish-German mother, he entered the British Foreign Office in 1893 and served as a diplomat in Russia. He bought property on Capri, but suffered financial difficulties and lived in near poverty for almost two decades. but you might not know it because he also lived in Paris, Florence, Lisbon, and London, before returning to Capri in 1946. He wrote novels, autobiographical works and travel books, and his 1917 novel South Wind was a fictionalized account of life in Capri which explored the pleasures of the hedonistic life, and that earned him epithets such as "pagan to the core" and "an unashamed connoisseur of pleasure.” He was also placed on leave from the diplomatic corps for an alleged affair, and he moved from place to place when scandal seemed to catch up him. Some of his works were filled with references to moral and sexual issues, and he would have been considered a depraved sexual criminal if he lived in modern times. His book here is a limited and numbered first edition, privately printed in 1927, in the original blue-green boards, with a paper label on the spine, blank endpapers with the owners’ names on the front flyleaf, then the half-title, followed by the limitation pages, which is signed by Douglas and says the book is number 217 of five hundred copies, the frontis is a photograph by Emery Walker, then a protective tissue guard, the copyright page says the book was printed in Florence  by the Tipografia Giuntina, the Contents page lists topics such as mammals, birds, reptiles and batrachians, sea beasts, and creeping things - batrachians are tailless frogs and toads; there’s a six-page Introduction by the author, 206 pages of text, a one-page Bibliography on 207, and the Index runs to page 219. The book is a collection of poems, epigrams, oracles, epitaphs and enigmas written by many Greek authors of antiquity and it explores the appearance of animals in Greek writing. Medieval authors included beasts in their texts after seeing these sources, and even if they did not have direct access to the poems themselves, they certainly had indirect access through later Latin authors (such as Pliny the Elder) who used many animal descriptions in their own works. The book measures 8 3/4 x 6 inches wide and is in pretty good condition. The binding is tight and the pages and text are clean, with chips on the paper label on the spine, chips on the spine, wear at the tips, light soiling on the endpapers and remnants of a small red star on the front flyleaf, and the tissue guard in front is present, but detached. 

Birds and Saints is a compilation of stories translated from the original Latin, and readers meet a range of creatures, from lions and hyenas, otters and hares, to a mouse, a fly, a frog, all of whom are given their own voices. Their relationships with saints such as Columba, Jerome, Cuthbert, and Simeon Stylites portray the spirituality of the early days of the Christian heritage, when miracles were commonplace and Christian legend came to life, and the stories run the gamut from the end of the fourth to the end of the twelfth century. The book has the original red boards, with gilt lettering and black decorations on the spine, the front cover is has black decorations of a squirrel with a saintly figure, very reminiscent of Francis of Assisi, blank endpapers, a pencilled note saying the book is a first edition, then the half-title, the frontis page repeats the decoration on the front cover, the title page says the book was translated by Helen Waddell and published in London by Constable in 1934, and there is just a single date on the title page and no other printings listed on the copyright page, which makes this a first edition, and the book has striking woodcuts by Robert Gibbings. There are three pages of Contents (vii - ix), a Translator’s note from xi to xx, 147 pages of text, a three-page bibliography (Sources), and a dust jacket illustrated by Gibbings as well, and the book has a red topstain applied by the publisher. Helen Waddell (1889 - 1965) was an Irish poet, medieval scholar, theological novelist, translator, publisher’s reader, and playwright. She was a recipient of the Benson Medal. A biography of her by the Benedictine nun Dame Felicitas Corrigan was published in 1986, winning the James Tait Black Award, and Gibbings was one of the founding members of the Society of Wood Engravers. Birds and Saints measures 8 3/8 x 6 3/8 in chess wide and is in good condition, with a tight binding and clean pages and text, the red boards have faded, with light rubbing on the heel and crown of the spine, a small pinch or bump at the bottom of the back board, the spine is darkened, there are shadows on the front flyleaf from the flap of the dust jacket, and chips on the heel and crown and at the top edges of the dust jacket. 

Anacreon (circa 573 - 495 B.C.) was a Greek poet who lived in the sixth century B.C. and was notable for his drinking songs and erotic poems. He wrote in an ancient Ionic dialect, which was spoken primarily in Asia Minor and was the basis for epic Greek poems, like Homer’s The Iliad and The Odyssey. Anacreon’s poetry was composed to be sung or recited to the accompaniment of music, usually the lyre, and his themes touched on love, disappointment, revelry, festivals, and observations of life and everyday people. The book is titled Anacreon, it is a limited edition (#199 of 500 copies) on hand-made paper, with a paper label on the spine, blank endpapers, the frontis page shows Anacreon playing a flute with maidens and is protected by a tissue guard, the title page says the book was translated by Thomas Stanley, illustrated by J. E. Weguelin, and published by Merrill & Baker   in New York in 1899, the limitation page follows the title page, there are 75 pages of text, with blank pages on the left of each poem and the actual poem on the right side, the top edge is gilt, and the first edition by Merrill & Baker was published in 1894, according to WorldCat. The book measures 9 1/8 x 6 3/8 inches wide and is in very good condition, with a tight binding and clean pages and text. The spine is a little dark and there are light bumps at the heel and crown of the spine and a small brown mark on the edge of the spine.