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Sebastian Hau

‘A Christmas Carol   in prose, being   A Ghost Story of Christmas’.
Designed by Alan Tabor, with frontispiece by Monro S. Orr.

Publisher’s beige cloth with green and red scroll design to upper board, green lettering to spine, top edges gilt, other edges untrimmed, mounted colour frontispiece plate, around 50 line drawings (including 6 full page), calligraphic text throughout (in double columns), decorative initials and borders throughout, decorative title page, printed in red and black throughout, [112] pages, 26.3 x 18 cm. 

First edition thus, 1916 (undated).
Date according to British Library.

This richly illuminated presentation of Charles Dickens’ classic festive tale was the magnum opus of Manchester illustrator and master calligrapher Alan Lansdown Tabor.  

Decorated in medieval style, with numerous line drawings plus a colour plate by the Scottish illustrator Monro Orr, this beautiful version of ‘A Christmas Carol’ was published in two forms: a trade edition (as here), plus a limited edition signed by Tabor, with a tiny print run of just 25 copies. Tabor’s original manuscript was donated by his widow to the John Rylands Library, Manchester in 1958.  

Alan Tabor (1883-1957) was born in Bedminster, Somerset. He established himself as a ‘commercial and artistic designer’ in Manchester in the early years of the 20th century, producing a wide range of work, including illuminated addresses and long-service certificates – for coal companies and the textile industry, among others – as well as general calligraphic work, including one-off pieces for churches. In 1937 he produced a loyal address from the City of Manchester upon the accession of George VI, and in 1943 he designed the scroll conferring the freedom of the city on Winston Churchill.   

Monro Scott Orr (born 1874) was an illustrator, painter and etcher who attended the celebrated Glasgow School of Art. His illustration style was very much character-driven, with a particular emphasis on faces and figures, often droll or grotesque in nature, recalling the humorous illustrations of W. Heath Robinson. Houfe describes Orr’s imagery as ‘bold and posterish’, with an influence from William Nicholson. His most notable books include ‘The Arabian Nights’ (1913), ‘Grimm’s Fairy Tales’ (1914), ‘Mother Goose’ (1915), ‘Andersen’s Fairy Tales’ (1925), ‘The Ballad of Jan Van Hunks’ (1929) and ‘Treasure Island’ (1934), as well as a lavish ‘Alphabet’ (1931).  

Condition:
Contents very clean overall, with no owner inscriptions. Usual age-toning to paper, some foxing (mostly to margins), a few pale smudges/finger-marks, occasional small stain, two or three pairs of gatherings slightly stretched, untrimmed (exposed) page edges with usual browning, foxing, creasing, nicks and wear. One of the line drawings glued in by publisher (as issued). Endpapers with usual offsetting. Binding tight, with lean. Boards and spine with soiling, discoloration and marks as shown, a little bumping, rubbing and wear to extremities (including very slight fraying to head of spine).

Children's books, Illustrated, Literature - Quantity: 1 - First edition, with mounted colour plate plus numerous line drawings - Book

Charles Dickens / Monro Orr, Alan Tabor - A Christmas Carol  - 1916

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Charles Dickens / Monro Orr, Alan Tabor - A Christmas Carol - 1916

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