Nonesuch Press
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Nonesuch Press was a private press founded in 1922 in London by Francis Meynell, his second wife Vera Mendel, and their mutual friend David Garnett,[1] co-owner of Birrell & Garnett's bookshop in Soho's Gerrard Street, in the basement of which the press began.[2]
History
Nonesuch Press's first book, a volume of
Nonesuch was unusual among private presses in that it used a small
Among the press's best-known editions were the collected works of
In November 2005,
Nonesuch editions of Dickens' novels have also been republished by
Week-End books
The Week-End Book was a single volume anthology of general reading designed for a weekend away in a cottage or on a boat. It was first published by the Nonesuch Press in June 1924 and was its best selling title.[5] Sales exceeded 100,000 copies within the first seven years. It continued to prove extremely popular and was reprinted in England 34 times up until 2006, sometime in facsimile.[6] It contained works of fiction and non-fiction in small articles that could be read in moments of leisure, and included a wide range of subjects including poetry, religious works, songs, jokes, games and recipes,[7] An American edition was added later.[8]
It was designed for a middle brow reader who wanted a wide range of cultural topics but never to go in too deep. Virginia Woolf once commented about the books, "The Hogarth Press may not make any money but at least we did not publish The Week-End Book."
References
- ^ Miranda Knorr. "The Nonesuch Press: A Product of Determination". An Exhibit of Rare Books at the Okanagan College Library; unavailable 14 Dec. 2021.
- ^ a b James A. Dearden, "Nonesuch Press", in Allen Kent, Harold Lancour, Jay E. Daily (eds), , Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science: Volume 20, New York: Marcel Dekker, Inc., 1977, p. 92.
- ^ "The Kynoch Press", The Typographic Hub.
- ^ Francis Meynell, "Personal element", in Symons, A. J. A., Francis Meynell and Desmond Flower, The Nonesuch Century: an appraisal, a personal note and a bibliography of the first hundred books issued by the Press, 1923-1934 (London: Nonesuch Press, 1936), p. 43].
- ^ "Do It Yourself Fun, 1920s Style". The New York Public Library. Retrieved 30 September 2019.
- ^ "How to sing round the campfire (and other weekend tips)". The Independent. 20 August 2005. Archived from the original on 21 June 2022. Retrieved 30 September 2019.
- ^ "Object of the Week: The Week-End Book". The International Anthony Burgess Foundation. 22 November 2017. Retrieved 30 September 2019.
- JSTOR 26402244.
Further reading
- ISBN 0370303970
- Rogerson, Ian. Sir Francis Meynell and the Nonesuch Press (1979)
- Rogerson, Ian. Sir Francis Meynell Designer Extraordinary (1992)
- Meynell, Francis. My Lives (The Bodley Head, 1971)
External links
- James A. Dearden, "Nonesuch Press", in Allen Kent, Harold Lancour, Jay E. Daily (eds), Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science: Volume 20, New York: Marcel Dekker, Inc., 1977, pp. 91–100.