UN COUP DE DÉS JAMAIS N’ABOLIRA LE HASARD (((SUN-O))): [A THROW OF THE DICE WILL NEVER ABOLISH CHANCE (((SUN-O)))]

Waitakere Ranges, New Zealand:: Sam Sampson,, 2022.. Edition of 20. 300 x 225 mm; 28 unnumbered pages. Digital Indigo printed on Mohawk archival paper (Ultra White Smooth pages 148gsm and cover 270gsm). Printed by Centurion, Auckland, New Zealand. Die-cut cover. Hand sewn binding with black thread. Hand-bound by Louise James of The Binding Studio in the Waitakere Ranges, West Auckland, New Zealand. Designed by jacindatorrance of Verso Visual Communications, Auckland. Numbered and signed by Sampson. Copies 1-10 housed in a hinged-lid box with magnetic flap, 35mm outer walls with Chelsea Beige 045 binding cloth (100 percent cotton with pigmented coating) with the ((( Sun-O ))) emblem foiled on the front in white. A black ribbon lifts out each edition. The boxes are lined with ColourPlan Bright Red acid-free paper and feature a different printed design inspired by the original Mallarmé poem and my homage. Each design is digital Indigo white ink and the typeface is DTL Elzevir. Sam Sampson's Un Coup de Dés Jamais N'Abolira le Hasard ((( Sun-O ))) was produced in 2022 on the 125th anniversary of the publication of Stéphane Mallarmé's original poem (1897).  Sam Sampson: "My response takes the form (scaffolding) of measuring each Mallarmé line on the page and approximating the font size. Each of my bullet pointed lines is an approximation of his line and the spatial dimension of the page represents the flow of his work. As Mallarmé's poem is a form of metaphysical gambling, his sentences reproduce the sensation of being both in and outside time, a type of prismatic subdivision, and I wanted to respond to this rhythm and arrangement of the poem by using the original text such that each of my pages reproduces collaged text from the exact same page of Mallarmé's poem. The Gallimard manuscript is the source, but it also brings into context a voice, a conversation from 1962 onwards where Roger's inscription (his name) leaves a mark in time. As with Mallarmé, I wanted the fungibility of time - the timeliness of a toss of the dice and the timelessness of chance. I wanted the poem to somehow capture, as Mallarmé had described it, 'the invitation of the great white space', and the successive, incessant, back-and-forth motions of our eyes travelling from one line to the next, and beginning all over again."  Book collector, blogger and essayist Robert Bolick has published an essay examining Sampson's Un Coup de Dés Jamais N'Abolira le Hasard ((( Sun-O ))). The full essay can be found on his blog Books on Books