Book Description

"The first edition of Jonathan Wantrup's 'Australian Rare Books 1788-1900' quickly became the internationally recognised definitive work on collecting rare Australian books of the Colonial Period. Welcoming the book in 1987, Kenneth Hince wrote that the work: . . . at once defines its own scope clearly, and proceeds to cover the ground precisely and accurately. It brings together a mass of material not otherwise available in a single book, and includes an impressive amount of previously unrecorded detail. The perspectives taken of the various subjects are orderly and illuminating . . .This revised and enlarged edition includes five new chapters. It begins with a discussion of the characteristics and techniques of book collecting, followed by a clear description of book manufacture and distribution over the past 200 years. The following chapters offer a comprehensive survey of the major Australian books that illuminate and chronicle our colonial past. Each is placed within its historical context, starting with the foundation years under the First Fleet governors, the era of Bligh and Macquarie, coastal and inland exploration in the century following settlement, and the fine illustrated topographical plate books published throughout the nineteenth century. To close the volume, two new chapters survey the beautiful Australian colourplate natural history books published from the 1790s to the 1890s.Offering a distinctive approach to Australian history and a unique perspective on the development of Australian society, Wantrup has a rare facility for making complicated things simple. Wearing his learning lightly, he writes in an engaging and approachable style that makes this book eminently readable." --Dust jacket gate fold.