Bookvica

[LETTERPRESS ABC] Uchenik-naborshchik [i.e. Typesetter Apprentice]

Vie, I.

Item #1022

Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe izdatel’stvo, 1927. IV, 80 pp.: ill. 23x15,5 cm. In original illustrated wrappers. Bumped edges of oversized covers, small tear of the spine and a few spots on front cover, otherwise a very good and clean copy.
First and only Russian edition. One of 3000 copies. Cover design in black and brown paint was produced by a constructivist artist Nikolai Sedel’nikov (1905-1994). VKhUTEMAS graduate, he is mostly known as a master of type design and photomontage compositions. His design was reproduced by V. Kalabushkin. Since he typeset all elements of both covers, they look like components from different dimensions.
This is one of a few handbooks on printing that was published in the Soviet Union in the 1920s. At that time, typesetting practice lacked relevant handbooks and manuals, the craft was mostly promoted by skilled workers.
The book was translated and revised by L.A. Tumerman. As he mentioned in the foreword, “Classic typesetting guides by Bauer and Kolomnin are out of print and very rare now”. He undertook the publication of this manual for novices, who had already started to work with movable type and printing press, to allow them to systematize all parts of the experience. Tumerman enlarged the German version adding stuff from the routine of the 1920s Russian printing houses. Some of illustrations to page layout, title typesetting, etc. were first included.
A curious section is devoted to labor law in the printing business. Some departments forbade labor of women and youth, others limited a workday. There are also required rooms listed and work instructions printed.

Only copy in Princeton University.

Price: $750.00