Lot 8
MacDiarmid, Hugh
A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle
Auction: Books & Manuscripts | 01 October 2026 from 10am | Lots 1 to 78
Description
Falkland: Kulgin Duval & Colin H. Hamilton [printed by the Officina Bodoni], 1969. 4to, original vellum-backed patterned boards, top edge gilt (others uncut), 8 woodcut illustrations by Frans Masereel, one of 160 copies signed by the author, artist, and printer G. Mardersteig, printed on Amalfi paper, light spotting on endpapers, with cardboard slipcase [Barr Officina Bodoni 83]
Provenance
Presentation copy, with inscription on front free endpaper dated June 1970, from MacDiarmid to Douglas Sealy (1929-2013), Irish critic, teacher and translator, ‘inscribed with gratitude and affection to Douglas Seeley [sic] who has tyawed with the root-hewn text of this poem and been of great help in many ways.’ Sealy subsequently contributed an article on MacDiarmid and Gaelic literature to the 1972 publication ‘Hugh MacDiarmid: a Critical Survey.’
Footnote
Kulgin Duval and Colin Hamilton were major contributors to Scottish life and letters in the 20th century as book collectors, publishers, booksellers and patrons of Scottish poets. Their most significant and enduring literary relationship was with Hugh MacDiarmid. Some of their most highly-regarded publications were of his work, with this illustrated edition of MacDiarmid's 1926 masterpiece 'A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle,' being regarded as the best of them. Giovanni (Hans) Mardersteig (1892-1977) was one the leading printers and typographers of the 20th century. Born in Germany, in the 1920s he founded in Switzerland the Officina Bodoni, a private press named after the 18th-century Italian engraver and typographer, Giambattista Bodoni, from whose original matrices he cast the type used to print his first books on a hand press. He later moved to Italy, where he spent the rest of his life producing high quality printing and designing typefaces, the best known being Dante. 'A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle' was the second collaboration between Duval and Mardersteig on a MacDiarmid text, Mardersteig having printed ‘The Kind of Poetry I Want’ in 1961.