Bookvica

[WHAT MAKES A BOOK RARE?] O redkoy knige [i.e. About a Rare Book]

Malein, I., Fleer, M.

Item #2154

Moscow; Petrograd: Gos.
izd-vo, 1923. 48 pp. 17x 12 cm. In original publisher’s wrappers. Loss of the pieces of the spine, tears to the wrappers, soiling of the
wrappers, Soviet library stamp on the rear wrapper. Otherwise good.
Scarce. First edition. 1 of 2,000 copies.

Published in 1923, this interesting book is
dedicated to the topic of rare books and ways
of their identification. The edition features the
text of a report delivered first at the final meeting
of the Book Science Courses organized by the
Petrograd Institute of Book Science in 1922, and
then, in a somewhat supplemented form, at one of
the regular meetings of the Russian Bibliological
Society. The publication can be divided into two
sections. The first section written by the founder
of the Russian Bibliological Society Alexander
Malein is aimed at providing an answer to the
question “What makes a book rare?” The author
starts off his narrative with the examination of
two early Russian editions about rare books:
Nikolay Berezin’s Russkiye knizhnyye redkosti
[i.e. Russian Book Rarities] (1902) and Dmitry
Ulyaninsky’s Sredi knig i ikh druzey [i.e. Among
Books and Their Friends] (1903). Malein represents
opinions of both authors (with a clear focus on the
latter, because of Ulyanisky’s attempt to narrow
the concept) regarding the rarity of books and
step-by-step discredits their 5-level definitions
of the concept, which included such provisions as
“editions the print-run of which didn’t exceeded 60
copies”, “editions that were destroyed”, etc. After
analysis of both editions, the author offers his own
understanding of a rare book: “A book that exists
in an absolutely small number of copies and has
scientific significance.” The second section of the
book written by Matvey Fleer focuses on Russian
bibliophiles and the definition of rare books in
which the author entirely agrees with Malein. As
regards to the first topic, Fleer underlines the low
quality of bibliophilism in the USSR and states
that Russian bibliophiles often collect books
solely out of vanity.
Alexander Malein was a Russian philologist,
bibliographer, bibliologist, and a corresponding
Member of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
After passing his master’s examination in the
St. Petersburg Institute of History and Philology
in 1894, he was sent abroad where he attended
lectures at the Heidelberg and Bonn Universities.
At different times, Alexander taught classical
philology at St. Petersburg University, Latin
at the Women's Pedagogical Institute and the
Historical and Philological Institute, etc. One
of the founders of the Russian Bibliological
Society, Malein worked at the Library of the USSR
Academy of Sciences, where he organized the
Cabinet of incunabula, rare foreign books, foreign
manuscripts and engravings.
Russian Bibliological Society was founded in Saint
Petersburg in 1899 and existed until 1931. The first
chairman (president) of the Russian Bibliological
Society was a bibliologist, bibliographer, librarian,
and translator Alexander Mikhailovich Lovyagin,
who was also the main initiator of the creation of
the RBS. The Russian Bibliological Society, among
other things, developed key issues of bibliography,
contributed to the streamlining of bibliographic
registration in state structures, as well as the
introduction of the teaching of bibliography and
bibliology as a separate subject in some higher
educational institutions in Russia. Importantly,
The Russian Bibliological Society developed
and proposed for consideration projects for the
creation of the Russian Book Chamber and the
Russian State Book Fund.
Overall, an interesting early Soviet edition about
rare books.

Price: $450.00