Air ambulance

We had noticed a sign about second hand books outside a house on the edge of Holne in years gone by, but on this occasion we actually made it in. The occupants turning out to be an army couple retired from somewhere west of London to Holne and who run a second hand book operation out of a large shed in their front garden, mainly in aid of the Devon Air Ambulance. It seems that they do rather well at it.

A lot of ladies' holiday reading, but I turned up the two volumes illustrated.

First, a celebration of 50 years of Jamaican independence, produced with or by the Daily Gleaner, lots of shots of front pages being included among the political, sporting and cultural events. Plus coverage of visits by world celebrities like Martin Luther King,  Haille Selassie and Fidel Castro.

Second, a luxury hardback, if not learned, edition of Romeo and Juliet from Sterling Signature of New York. From reference 1, I learn that this is an imprint of Sterling Publishing, an imprint which does what one might call gift books and which appears to include half a dozen or so of the better known Bardic plays. Rather more books about various aspects of wedding planning.

Romeo and Juliet comes with a reasonable amount of apparatus, including introductory essays and in-page translations of obscure words and usages. Nicely produced with good quality paper, generous amounts of white space and respectable binding in signatures. But the main point is the illustrations by one Kevin Stanton including a lot of what one might call cut-out art. See reference 2. While reference 3 gives quite a good idea of his contribution to the book in question.

Apart from adding to my collection of Bardic texts, Arden and other, the book has served to remind me of a rather odd speech by Romeo in Act III, Scene III in which he compares his lot to that of a carrion fly, still allowed to crawl the hand of his Juliet. The gloss tells me that the carrion fly is the sort of fly which lays its eggs in rotting flesh.

Reference 1: https://www.sterlingpublishing.com/.

Reference 2: https://www.behance.net/kevinjaystanton.

Reference 3: https://www.behance.net/gallery/3874119/Romeo-and-Juliet.