The Enemies of Books

Third Edition. Tall 8vo. Pp. xiii, 114, [4]. Tan buckram over reddish-brown boards, lettered in gilt to spine; patterned endpapers, untrimmed text block edges. Original decorated wrappers bound in. In the intact glassine dustjacket. Frontispiece & 7 b/w pls., one folding and one double-page photographic plate showing two leaves of a bookworm-infested "Caxton".

An excellent copy.

This classic treatise on biblioclasts [destroyers or mutilators of books] and book preservation – Blades's most popular work – underwent multiple printings and re-issues following its 1880 first edition. By the author of the 2 vol. Life and Typography of William Caxton, England's First Printer (1861/63), whose canonical conclusions were arrived at after careful examination of types in Caxton's early books.