Printed the sheets that will be included in the deluxe copies (only) of Paper Should Not Always Be White over the long weekend. Couldn't be sure how many would make the book in the end until the work had been done, or even how many deluxe copies there would be. It all depended on how many decent impressions from each type of paper we got (or more precisely, the smallest number of good impressions from any one of the sheets).
These extra sheets in the deluxe copies are not an arbitrary limitation: they are papers that we had just a few sheets each of, not enough for the entire edition (which is already small enough). With all the samples now printed, we can report that Updike's words are printed on a total of 15 papers; the deluxe copies will have an additional seven sheets. These are:
Three Barcham Greens: Saunders Blue and Maidstone (both taken from a sample pack sent out from Spicer's - a Canadian paper supply company - in the 1970s), and Turner Grey, a package of which was sent from our friend Will Rueter's collection (along with the original label). It actually is green...
Some very thin J. Whatman mould made, with the date 1958 in the watermark. This means the paper was some of the last made by the original mill before closing in 1963. The name, and cylinder machines, were revived in the 1980s...
And perhaps most unusual of all, a sheet culled from one of Joan Blaeu's Atlas Maior (printed c.1665).
Before you recoil in alarm, these sheets came from a collection of pages from a volume (The Payes Baxos, from the Spanish edition of the atlas) that were found in the scrap bin at a restoration binder's workshop. Apparently the complete volume had survived intact until the late 1990s, when it was found by some barbarian who proceeded to cut out all of the maps and more interesting text pages. He presented the remaining, amputated pages to the binder, knowing they could be used for paper repairs etc. which indeed they were, before we found what was left.
Last run of the book today: the Everson quote (shown at top), which precedes the title page. The prelims are being printed on Arches Wove 120 g, which is heavier than most of the sample papers. To to keep the sections reasonably consistent in thickness, we're printing the prelims (the title page sheet and the two-page foreword) as folios.
The deluxe copies are rounded out with a beautiful cream sheet of Chancery, made at the University of Iowa's Center for the Book (more on that in a future post), and a very blue sheet from Griffen Mill.
With everything now said and done, we can reliably report that the edition will be 30 numbered copies (plus four A.P.). The first ten will include the seven additional papers, and be more elaborately bound. Everything lands in Claudia's bindery next week.
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