Item #65081 Konx Om Pax [ Review Issue ]; Essays in Light. Aleister CROWLEY.
Konx Om Pax [ Review Issue ]; Essays in Light
Konx Om Pax [ Review Issue ]; Essays in Light

Konx Om Pax [ Review Issue ]; Essays in Light

Boleskine & London: SPRT / Walter Scott Publishing, 1907. First Edition - Review Issue. Hardcover. Squarish Octavo (8" x 6 3/4"), Original black buckram, with intricate highly stylized design of book's title stamped in white on top board. xii [+ ii] + 108pp [+ 12 pp adverts] . Frontis. Title page in red and black. Scarce "Review Issue." The stated limitation of "Konx om Pax" was 500 numbered copies (excluding a handful of special copies for the author) about half of which were bound in black buckram with white printing (symbolising light out of darkness), constituting the first issue, with the rest bound in gilt stamped white buckram. A tiny number of the "black-bound" copies were used for a "Review Issue," of which this is one. The "Review Issue," differs from the regular "black-bound" issue in that the usual limitation page (with its printed statement that the book is limited to 500 numbered copies, etc.), has been replaced with a page on which is simply printed: "Review copy - Not for Sale", and the frontispiece that was bound into the "in series" copies was omitted. Clearly only a very small number of these "Review Issues" were released, and they are much scarcer than the regular "in series" copies of the book. A short pencil note in the bottom margin of p. vii indicating a passage with a vertical pencil line and reading "also pp. 32 & 50" (with pencil lines next to particular passages on those pages) appears to be IN CROWLEY'S HANDWRITING. Unfortunately there is insufficient marginalia to say definitively whether or not it Crowley's work, but the letters and numerals close enough to his handwriting that they could well be his. Also, given the context Crowley could sensibly have written what is there, and as he was almost certainly personally responsible for the distribution of the review copies of "Konx om Pax" if anyone were to have toyed with them it was likely to be him. "Konx om Pax" is a collection of poetry, plays and essays and was clearly one of Crowley's own favorite works. He wrote glowingly of it in his "Confessions," in particular describing the final essay 'The Stone of the Philosophers' as being "really beyond praise." From the collection of Clive Harper with his discrete book-label neatly tipped in at the rear. Harper is well-known as the bibliographer of Austin Osman Spare, for updating the Aleister Crowley bibliography in the 2011 Teitan Press collection of Gerald Yorke's writings, and as someone who has lent his expertise to numerous other publications. The label can easily be removed without affecting the page, although it would be a shame not to preserve this record of the book's provenance. A couple of light horizontal creases to the spine, cloth a bit rubbed with a hint of wear to the points, moderate foxing throughout. Overall the binding is in much better shape than that in which copies of the "black" version are typically encounted (the white stylized lettering of the cover design printed onto the black buckram tends to flake off quite easily). Scattered moderate foxing throughout, heaviest in the first and last few leaves. A sound VG+ copy of a very rare issue. Item #65081

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