The Chinese Lion (Bertram Rota Limited Edition)

London: Bertram Rota, 1937 Hard cover, 12mo in half Venetian red book cloth over batiked silk-covered boards of indigo, orange and cream, with an applied cloth label in Chinese characters as title to the front board , and additionally in English in gilt to the spine,13pp., First Edition. Numbered 181 of a limited edition of 350 copies on printer's colophon. (Shown here in the slipcase with a new mylar replacement of the original torn, discolored glassine.) In the original sage green slipcase, both sides of which are block-printed in Venetian red with the image of a Chinese lion. Condition : Fine. The printer states this was a short story written about 1926 and published first here, although copyright belonged to others, used with permission. English Author Mary Gladys Meredith Webb (1881-1927) gives us a powerful short story based on the physical separation of a young woman and her beau, off to do some top secret intelligence work for six months in a Far Eastern locale. This bookseller has, for many years, admired the work of Mary Webb, and how the Shropshire-born author used poetic descriptive detail in her writing. Without giving too much of the plot away, the item for sale uses symbols, colors and designs in the physical object which entirely enhance and reflect the plot. Like the best of Webb's work, the story remains with you long after reading. Watson 768.. Limited Edition No. 181 of 350 copies. Hard Cover. Fine.