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A title from The Old School Press A Long Story A four-part poem by
Andrew Motion, with four wood-engravings by Simon Brett | |||||||
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About the book To provide an early focus for its work in printing poetry, The Old School Press published a series of five books, each consisting of new work by a contemporary British poet, accompanied by illustrations by British artists. For the fifth title in our series of the work of contemporary British poets, we were fortunate to have the opportunity of printing an extended four-part poem by Poet Laureate emeritus Andrew Motion. Writing of his work, Motion says 'A Long Story assembled itself over several years into a loose sequence of four sections, none of them rhymed, and all are written in a very loose, rambling rhythm. I began with the wish to identify certain memories in my childhood which I've always considered to be 'spots of time' - ie, moments which have a self-contained interest and drama - and ended up with scenes which anticipate (even predict) certain moods and attitudes I have as an adult.' To complement Motion's narrative style, we turned once more to leading wood-engraver Simon Brett, whose ability to tell a story in a single sinewy image we greatly admire, and who cut four wood-engravings for the book. About the edition The text was hand-set in 14pt Fournier italic and printed on 170gsm Magnani mould-made paper. The book follows the series binding style: quarter-bound with yellow cloth on the spine, this time with a rich dark green hand-made paper from the Larroque mill covering the boards, black Canson end-papers, and the title embossed in gold on the front cover. 230 copies. All copies are signed by poet and artist. 44pp. The price was £72 each for bound copies. Unbound sets of sheets are £50. | |||||||
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Find out more about the book |
View one of Simon Brett's wood engravings: |
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View a designer binding by Rachel Ward-Sale |
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View a designer binding by Kate Holland |
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What others have said about the book |
‘What a lovely book!’, ‘An excellent book’, ‘A very nice book’, ‘Marvellous’, ‘A lovely book’ |
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The story In May 2001 I wrote to the then Poet Laureate, Andrew Motion, suggesting that he might like to do a book with The Old School Press. Driving back from London one Sunday night we had listened to a programme he had made on the music of Bob Dylan and I used this as an excuse to write suggesting that something on Dylan would be good. To establish some bona fides I sent a copy of Figures in a Setting and (I think) The Phoenix. He replied, saying ‘perhaps not Dylan’, but offering A Long Story. I jumped at the chance and knew after reading it that Simon Brett would be the person to do the images. I visited Motion at his home and discussed what the book might look like. As it was to be the fifth in the poetry series the general format was fixed, in particular the dark green Larroque (which I had bought in anticipation of doing a very short edition of six poems promised by Ted Hughes that sadly did not arrive before his death), black Canson for the end-papers, and the page size. He was taken by the Larroque fortunately and by the samples of Simon’s work that I took: I think he had recently had some of Simon’s work in another book of his, so we were in quick agreement that I should contact Simon and see how he felt about working on four blocks to go with the poem. Motion did not want anything that smacked of Cider with Rosie, and we both felt that something not too representational would be right. I wrote to Simon who came back with some sketches that I checked with Motion, positively. By now I had decided on the recently acquired fount of 14pt Monotype Fournier italic and the question of paper remained. Simon Lawrence had some time before told me about the Magnani he had persuaded John Purcell to have made by Fabriano and I had bought a few sheets to try out. It seemed very toothy and rather dry, but decided anyway to try it and ordered the stock. It was clear that the engravings would need to be printed on damp paper, so I also bought a considerable quantity (as it felt) of large blotting boards. In the event I decided (after further discussions with Simon Lawrence and Graham Moss who was at the same time printing his book on Thomas Lowinsky in Fournier on Magnani!) that the text could be printed on dry sheets, thus reducing the effort considerably. I was desperate to have something to take to the November Oxford Fair, and in particular had to make sure of getting the engravings, title page, and perhaps some of the text ready in a dummy. I collected the dummy from Rachel James on the day before the Fair. It was well received, not least by Simon Brett – I wondered how he would react to the way I had printed his blocks – well enough for him to sign the edition on 5 December ready for Motion to sign the following day and for the sheets for the first 100 copies to go to Rachel the day after that. Two of the blocks had considerable masses of black and I anticipated big problems getting that amount of ink onto them and off again onto the paper, but in the event they ran quickly with little make-ready. By contrast, the block that looked evenly cut and not too heavy (Serenade) proved very difficult to print, requiring many layers of make-ready to hold lines and bring up blacks. The blocks absorbed lots of ink and I was re-inking perhaps every five sheets. Blocks 1 and 4 were printed together on the same sheet, as were 2 and 4. |
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Find out about other titles in the series - click on the green blobs |
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