Jacob Matham’s engraving, “Hope”, 1597, after Hendrik Goltzius

Jacob Matham (1571–1631)

“Hope” (aka “L’espérance” [Bartsch title]; “Spes”), 1597, after Hendrik Goltzius (aka Hendrick Goltzius) (1558–1617), plate 2 from the series of seven engravings, “The Virtues” (half-length), with a verse by Cornelis Schonaeus (1541–1611), published Hendrik Goltzius in Haarlem.

Note: the Curator of the British Museum advises that the series “was first published by Goltzius in Haarlem in 1597; later by Robert de Baudous around 1615; by Johannes Janssonius in Amsterdam (before 1664); by Pieter de Reyger (before 1677); and finally by Gerard Valck (before 1729)” (see BM no. 1857,0613.494).

Engraving on laid paper trimmed along the platemark and backed with a support sheet.

Size: (sheet) 15.1 x 10.6 cm; (image borderline) 13.4 x 10.4 cm

Numbered on the plate within the image (on anchor): "2”

Lettered below the image borderline in two lines of Latin text (composed by Cornelis Schonaeus): “Mærentes recreo, vite ne tedeat egre, / Adverse prebens solati dulcia sortis.”

State i (of ii) before the addition of the publisher’s address.

TIB 4 (3). 118 (163) (Walter L Strauss [ed.] 1980, "The Illustrated Bartsch 4: Netherlandish Artists”, vol. 4. Abaris Books, New York, p. 108); New Hollstein (Dutch & Flemish) 139.I (Jacob Matham); Hollstein 257.I; New Hollstein (Dutch & Flemish) 505-511 (Hendrick Goltzius; Prints after inventions by Goltzius); Bartsch III.163.118.

The British Museum offers the following description of this print:

“Plate 2: Hope. A female figure, half-length looking up to right, with an upturned anchor, in a grotto with the sea in the distance and a ship; first state before publisher's address; after Goltzius. 1597”

(http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=1480521&partId=1&searchText=hope+matham&page=1)  

See also the description of this print at the Rijksmuseum:

http://hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.collect.150575

Condition: crisp, first state (lifetime) impression trimmed to the platemark and laid upon an archival support sheet of millennium quality washi paper. The lower-left corner is fractured and there is a pale area of discolouration on the boat portrayed in the distance otherwise the sheet is in very good condition.

I am selling this sensitively executed and elegant engraving exemplifying the period style of Mannerism of the late 16^th century, for AU$357 in total (currently US$254.06/EUR219.61/GBP193.21 at the time of posting this listing) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world.

If you are interested in purchasing this rare first state engraving personifying the virtue of hope, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

This print has been sold

For those who may be wondering why the personification of the virtue of hope—shown here—is carrying an anchor and the significance of the boat in the far distance, the explanation is simple: an anchor symbolises a sailor’s last resort (i.e. hope) to survive storms. Hence the mythological goddess representing hope holds an anchor with a boat behind her. Interestingly, Goltzius in his design for this particular goddess has gone a step further in symbolising a sailor’s hope. From my reading of this image, Golzius’ choice to turn the anchor “upside down” and to add a spiritually transcendent facial expression to the goddess brings together a sailor’s hope with Christian symbolism. What I mean by this is that the upturned anchor references the Christian cross and the goddess’ somewhat theatrical expression with upcast eyes references the early images of Christ’s spiritual transcendence in accordance with the verse from Hebrews 6:19 (NIV translation): "We have this hope as an anchor for the soul …”

Alfred-Alexandre Delauney’s huge etching, “View of the Cologne Cathedral”, 1886

Alfred-Alexandre Delauney (1830-1895)

“View of the Cologne Cathedral” (aka “View of the Dom Church in Cologne” [Rijksmuseum title]), 1886 (as inscribed on plate), proof before titling, hand­-signed by Delauney, printed by A Clément (fl. c. 1887–92), published by Valadon & Cie. Kunsthandel Boussod (aka Goupil) (1827–1919) and Michael Knoedler & Co (fl.1846 –87) in London, Paris and New York (as inscribed on plate).

Etching on heavy laid paper (3.5 cm chain lines) with full margins as published, signed in pencil by the artist and backed with a support sheet.

Size: (sheet) 93 x 65.5 cm; (plate) 76.8 x 52.5 cm; (image borderline) 72 x 49 cm

Hand-signed in pencil by Alfred-Alexandre Delauney below the image borderline at lower right.

Inscribed on plate above the image borderline: (right of centre) “April ts London Published by Boussod, Valadon & Co. successors to Goupil & Co. 116 & 117 New Bond Street W.and 9 Rue Chaptal Paris. Copyright registered”

Lettered on plate below the image borderline: (left) “'Berlin, Verlag von Boussod, Valadon & Co.”; (centre) “'Publié par BOUSSOD, VALADON & Co. Successeurs de GOUPIL & Cie 1er Avril 1885_ PARIS_LONDRES_LA HAYE”; (right) “New York_Published by M. Knoedler.”

Proof before the addition the title.

The Rijksmuseum offers the following description of this print:

(transl.) “In the foreground a block of houses in a bird's-eye view. On the second ground, the towers of the church rise and cover the entire height of the print.” (http://hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.103096)

Condition: proof state richly inked and faultless impression but with a closed tear in the lower left margin and a few minor spots and signs of handling in the margins. The sheet is backed with a support sheet of archival (millennium quality) washi paper.

I am selling this visually arresting and technically breathtaking hand-signed proof state 19^th century masterpiece of etching for AU$424 (currently US$301.84/EUR260.49/GBP228.48 at the time of posting this print) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world (but not, of course, any import duties/taxes imposed by some countries).

If you are interested in purchasing this awe inspiring, crowd stopping print, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

This print has been sold

This is such a large print that when I hold it from its upper edges the sheet is waist high from the ground... a huge etching! Beyond its jaw-dropping and eye-popping size, the etching is a technical masterwork of the printmaker’s drawing skill and the printer’s dedication to the task of subtly capturing in this proof-state impression the finely rendered detail.

One feature of this amazing print that catches my eye is the perspective that Delauney employs in portraying the steeply rising towers of the cathedral. At first glance, the rules of perspective seem to be in place with the towers gently converging skywards to a far distant point in the zenith. On closer examination, however, Delauney’s manipulation of perspective becomes clearer. For example, the viewpoint for this scene is an elevated one—a high flying drone’s viewpoint almost midway up the towers—and yet we see the portico arches of the church as if from the viewpoint of a worm on the ground.

Jan Collaert II’s set of four engravings (c1600) after Maarten de Vos

Jan Collaert II (aka Hans Collaert; Jan Baptist I Collaert) (c1561– c1620)

Four engravings from the series (smaller plates), “Vita, Passio, et Resurrectio Iesu Christi” (The life, passion and resurrection of Christ), c1600 (1598?), after the designs by Maarten de Vos (aka Marten de Vos; Maerten de Vos) (1532–1603).

Engravings on laid paper trimmed with thread margins along the image borderlines and with printed text and images verso.

Size: (each sheet with slight size variations) 10 x 6.1 cm

All the prints are inscribed on plate within the image borderline at the lower edge with the engraver’s name (either “Ioan Collaert Sculp.” or “I. Collaert Sculp.”), and all plates, apart from the engraving showing Christ at the foot of the cross, are inscribed with the designer’s name, “M. de Vos inuent.”

Condition: richly inked and well-printed impressions with crisp lines showing no wear to the printing plate. Each sheet is trimmed close to the image borderline with printed text from the original publication verso (two of the sheets have additional engravings verso) and all the prints are in excellent condition (i.e. there are no tears, holes, folds, abrasions, stains or foxing).

I am selling this set of four exquisite engravings by one of the major Flemish old master printmakers at the cusp of the 16^th and 17^th centuries for AU$216 (currently US$153.30/EUR132.41/GBP115.87 at the time of posting this print) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world (but not, of course, any import duties/taxes imposed by some countries).

If you are interested in purchasing this suite of near faultless engravings, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

This set of prints has been sold

These are very small prints measuring no more than the palm of one’s hand … or at least my hand! Despite their small size, the portrayed scenes are easy to read even at a distance. This legibility of the images testifies to the original designer’s (Maarten de Vos) understanding of how to arrange the pattern of lights and darks in the compositions to ensure that only critically important details are highlighted. It also, of course, testifies to the amazing skill and dexterity of the engraver, Jan Collaert II, to miniaturise his strokes in rendering the details.

Like many early biblical illustrations, the composition of each panel shows more than a single event in Christ’s final days. For example the left panel invites the viewer to correlate the vision of sleeping apostles in the foreground with Christ praying in the middle distance and Judas’ betrayal of Christ’s location in the far distance. (My apologies if I’m wrong about the interaction of the distant figures.) See also the composite timeline captured in the second panel from the left wherein Christ is being tortured in the foreground by having his crown of thorns pressed onto his head while, simultaneously, Christ is being presented to Pontius Pilate in a further away room.

Jan Sadeler’s engraving “Noah Building the Ark”, 1586

Jan Sadeler I (aka Johannes Sadeler; Johann Sadeler) (1550–1600)

“Noah Building the Ark” (TIB title) (aka “Construction of the Ark”), 1586, plate 12 from the series, “The Story of the Family of Seth” (aka “Bonorum et Malorum Consensio: The Knowledge of Good and Evil”), after a lost drawing by Maarten de Vos (aka Marten de Vos; Maerten de Vos) (1532–1603), published by Jan Sadeler I in Antwerp.

Engraving on laid paper trimmed along the platemark and backed with a support sheet.

Size: (sheet) 20.6 x 27.7 cm; (image borderline) 19.4 x 27.6 cm.

Numbered on plate within the image borderline: (partially erased at top centre edge) “XII”.

Inscribed on plate within the image borderline: (on anvil at lower left) “Sadelerus/ auct; scal”; (centre of lower edge) ‘Genes; cap: 6”; (lower right) “M. de vos figure:”

Lettered in two columns of two lines on plate below the image borderline: "Nec mora continuo .../ …// …/ …/ … ullis."

State ii (of ii) with the addition of the plate number (XII) at the top edge.

TIB 70. 040 S2 (Isabelle de Ramaix 1999, “The Illustrated Bartsch”, vol. 70, Part 1 [Supplement], Abaris Books, p. 61); Nagler 1835 1835–52m bi, 20; Le Blanc, no. 40; Wurzbach, no. 9.12; Hollstein 1980, vol. 21, no. 40; Edquist, p. 14, no. 18b; Ramaix 1992, no. 29.

The British Museum offers the following description of this print:

“Construction of the Ark. Noah and another man saws a log before the skeletal superstructure of the Ark; a youth inside the boat hammers nails into the planks”

(http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=1544667&partId=1&searchText=Noah+ark&page=1)

See also the description of this print at the Rijksmuseum:

http://hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.168201

Condition: richly inked and well-printed (near faultless) impression in excellent condition (i.e. there are no tears, folds, holes, abrasions, significant stains or foxing). The sheet is.trimmed along the platemark and backed with a support sheet of archival (millennium quality) washi paper.

I am selling this graphically strong and beautifully executed engraving by one of the most famous of the Flemish old masters for AU$288 (currently US$204.26/EUR177.72/GBP155.30 at the time of posting this print) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world (but not, of course, any import duties/taxes imposed by some countries).

If you are interested in purchasing this masterwork of engraving displaying technical excellence and a solid knowledge of perspective and rendering forms, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

This print has been sold

Years ago I remember seeing in a remote village in the Solomon Islands the construction of a contemporary version of Noah’s Ark crafted without power tools and heaps of loving care. What impressed me when looking at this monstrous ship that the Islanders were making was the exposed skeleton of the wooden craft’s inner ribs as shown here. Even now, I still picture in my mind’s eye very clearly the cocoon-like arrangement of the wooden framework receding into darkness.

The reason that I mention this memory is that Sadeler has not simply drawn a partly constructed ship as an illustration to the biblical event of Noah and his sons building the Ark. Instead, Sadeler—and the intermediary draughtsman, Maarten de Vos—have visually “carved” the skeleton frame of the vessel into the illusion of believable space where light and air move freely through the gaps.

From my past life as a teacher of drawing, the idea of creating the illusion of space that seems real is not simply a case of employing the principles of perspective in a perfunctory way. Instead, achieving a meaningful illusion of space is more about “feeling”—sensing—and laying out the features of a scene from personal experience in a subconscious/intuitive manner. What I mean by this is that Sadeler has not drawn this ship by calculated reasoning. Rather, he has allowed his creative invention to enter into the skeleton framework of the ship and to arrange the ship’s features where he knew from experience they should be.

Willem Isaacsz. van Swanenburg’s engraving (with etching), “Judas Iscariot”, 1611

Willem Isaacsz. van Swanenburg (aka Willem van Swanenburg) (1580–1612)

“Judas Iscariot” (aka “Judas hangs himself”; “Ivdas Iscarioth” [title on plate]), 1611, plate 6 after Abraham Bloemaert (1564–1651), from the series of six engravings, “Sinners of the Old and New Testament” (Hollstein 7–12), published by Willem van Swanenburg, with lines of text by Petrus Scriverius (aka Peter Schrijver; Peter Schryver) (1576–1660).

Engraving with etching on fine laid paper.

Size: (sheet) 36.8 x 23.8 cm; (plate) 27.2 x 17.2 cm; (image borderline) 24.6 x 16.6 cm

Inscribed on plate within the image borderline: (upper right) “A.Bloemaert Inventor / W. Swanenb. Sculp: et excud. / 1611.”

Lettered on plate below the image borderline in two columns of three lines of descriptive Latin text by Petrus Scriverius: "Iamdudum temeras Deum, ... / ... triste pependit onus.”; (lower centre) "IVDAS ISCARIOTH."; (lower right corner) “[…] 6. / P.S extempore.”

State iii (of iii)

Hollstein Dutch 12-3 (3)

The British Museum offers the following description of this print:

“Judas Iscariot. The apostle seated under a tree and tying a rope around his neck, a pouch with coins next to him at left, Judas seen hanging from a tree in right background”

(http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=3101811&partId=1&searchText=Abraham+Bloemaert+&people=105989&page=1)

See also the description of this print at the Rijksmuseum:

http://hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.38075

Condition: near faultless impression with generous margins in excellent condition (i.e. there are no tears, folds, holes, abrasions or significant stains—there are two dots in the margin towards the lower right).

I am selling this museum-quality engraving from 1611 that I see as fitting the description of “ravishingly beautiful” for AU$360 (currently US$254.67/EUR221.94/GBP195.12 at the time of posting this print) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world (but not, of course, any import duties/taxes imposed by some countries).

If you are interested in purchasing this masterwork of engraving displaying technical excellence of the highest order, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

This print has been sold

Artists in the early 17^th century had a special visual device to make even a deeply disturbing scene like the suicide scene shown here seem like a poetic and sensually beautiful event: “the line of grace” (i.e. a serpentine curved line in the composition that flows through a composition).

This gentle “S”-shaped flow in the composition leading vertically from the foreground up through the centre of Judas to the tree behind him not only links the the earth with the sky beyond in a visually seductive way, but it also helps to subliminally suggest the notion of Judas’ pending death by hanging portrayed graphically in the far distance on the right. What I mean by this subliminal projection of his “pending death” is the dynamic line passing up through the centre of the apostle follows a path tracing through the rope noose around Judas' neck as well as through the space between his arms and the space between the forked limbs of the tree behind him. In short, what I psychologically feel when I follow the course of the “line of grace”—and I need to add that this may be a strictly personal experience—is akin to the act of strangulation that Judas is entering into.

Jean Pierre Norblin de la Gourdaine’s etching (with drypoint), “The Little Philosopher”, 1776

Jean Pierre Norblin de la Gourdaine (aka Jean Pierre Norblin de la Gordaine) (1745–1830)

“The Little Philosopher”, 1776 (based on the date inscribed on the plate in an earlier state)

Etching and drypoint on ivory Japanese (wove) paper trimmed with narrow margins.

Size: (sheet) 8.1 x 9.1 cm; (plate) 7.8 x 8.9 cm

State iii after the erasure of the inscribed date of the first state and reduction in the size of the plate.

Hillemacher 1848 18.III

See also the descriptions of this print at:

The British Museum (http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=1533881&partId=1&searchText=NORBLIN+de+la+GOURDAINE+&page=1);

The Minneapolis Institute of Art

(https://collections.artsmia.org/art/105119/the-little-philosopher-jean-pierre-norblin-de-la-gourdaine);

The Art Institute of Chicago

(http://www.artic.edu/aic/collections/artwork/141430?search_no=1&index=5);

The Rijksmuseum

(http://hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.158669)

Condition: richly inked and almost faultless impression trimmed with narrow margins around the platemark in near pristine condition (i.e. there are no tears, folds, holes, abrasions, stains or foxing).

I am selling this exceptionally rare and glowing etching by one of the most important artists of the Enlightenment in Poland for AU$326 (currently US$230.26/EUR200.51/GBP176.62 at the time of posting this print) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world (but not, of course, any import duties/taxes imposed by some countries).

If you are interested in purchasing this masterwork from the 1700s following in the tradition of Rembrandt, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

This print has been sold

Mindful that Jean Pierre Norblin de la Gourdaine is celebrated for his images showing the final years of Republic of the Two Nations (viz. the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania), this etching of a young boy may seem to be somewhat outside of what he is famous, in terms of portraying political unrest; see for example the bizarre execution scene in Norblin’s painting, “Hanging of Traitors”, 1794 (https://austenetterespublica.wordpress.com/gallery/artists/jean-pierre-norblin-de-la-gourdaine/4612_12514543694/), where traitors in absentia (i.e. sensible folk who had fled the country) are symbolically hung at the gallows by their painted portrait raised in a noose.

From my way of looking at what is portrayed in this etching, however, the subject is far from being simply a portrait that the BM describes as a “[s]eated boy wearing a gown, three-quarter length, leaning against a table upon which are a quill, a skull, and book” (http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=1533881&partId=1&searchText=NORBLIN+de+la+GOURDAINE+&page=1). After all, as the title of the print, “The little philosopher”, suggests, the boy is a light-hearted personification of the philosophical dilemma that all folk ultimately face: life is brief and we will die. Norblin has expressed this vanitas theme using the very obvious symbolic device of a skull “looking” at the boy as well as more subtle references to reflective thought such as the contemplative pose of the boy, the “blank” sheet of paper with a writing quill beside it and the ghost-like rendering of the shadow cast by the boy. For me, the treatment of this shadow is especially interesting, as I see the boldly hatched lines describing the shadow’s tone as creating a very different space to the pictorial/physical space that the boy occupies: a graphic representation of noetic space (i.e. the non-pictorial and non-physical space of contemplative thinking).

Pieter de Jode II’s engaving, “Erycius Puteanus”, 1630–45, after Anthony Van Dyck

Pieter de Jode II (aka Pieter de Iode; Petrus iunior de Jode; Pieter de Jonge Jode) (1606–1670/74)

“Erycius Puteanus”, 1630–1645, from the series after Anthony Van Dyck (1599–1641), “Icones Principum Virorum” (aka “'Icones Principum Virorum Doctorum Pictorum Chalcographorum Statuariorum nec non amatorum pictoriae artis numero centum ab Antonio Van Dyck Pictore ad vivum expressae, eiusq[ue] sumptibus aeri incisae”), published in the Hendrick and Cornelis Verdussen (Antwerp) edition of 1720. 

Engraving on fine laid paper.

Size: 33.6 x 23 cm; (plate) 22.7 x 17.2 cm; (image borderline) 20.4 x 16.9 cm

Initialed on plate within the image borderline at lower left: “I”

Lettered on plate below the image borderline: (lower left) "Ant. van Dÿck pinxcit / Pet. de Iode Sculp.”; (centre) "CLARISSIMVS ERYCVS PVTEANVS HISTORIOGRAPHVS / REGIVS PROFESSOR CONSILIARIVS ETC."; (lower right) "Cum priuilegio."

State vii with the previous publisher’s initials—“GH” (Gillis Hendricx [fl.1640–70])—burnished/erased. (Note: the mount into which this print was once displayed has a pencil notation that this impression is from the Hendrick and Cornelis Verdussen [Antwerp] edition published in 1720.)

Mauquoy-Hendrickx 1991 36.VII (Marie Mauquoy-Hendrickx 1991, “L'Iconographie d'Antoine Van Dyck, Catalogue raisonné”, 2 vols, Brussels, Bibliotheque Royale Albert Ier); Hollstein 144 (De Jode); New Hollstein (Dutch & Flemish) 42.VII (Van Dyck); Muller II 1853 4321; van Someren 1888 M.4321

The British Museum offers the following description of this print:

“Portrait of Erycius Puteanus, half-length in front of a swagged curtain to left, book shelves to right; with long hair, moustache and beard, his right hand resting on an opening book in front”

(http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=1425710&partId=1&searchText=Pet.+de+Iode+Sculp.&people=101862&page=1)

Note: The BM’s state vii impression (see BM no. 1863,0509.913) is hand inscribed in ink with the number “28” at the upper right corner, which most likely indicates the position of this print in the 1759 edition of 125 portraits.

Condition: superbly crisp, richly inked and well-printed impression with generous margins in excellent/museum-quality condition (i.e. there are no tears, folds, holes, abrasions, significant stains or foxing). There is a collector’s ink stamp (verso).

I am selling this exceptionally rare engraving by one of the most important printmakers of the 17^th century for AU$198 (currently US$139.70/EUR121.22/GBP106.47 at the time of posting this listing) including postage and handling to anywhere in the world (but not, of course, any import duties/taxes imposed by some countries).

If you are interested in purchasing this stunning print from one of the greatest—or at least the most historically significant—series of portraits ever engraved, please contact me (oz_jim@printsandprinciples.com) and I will send you a PayPal invoice to make the payment easy.

This print has been sold

The British Museum offers the following biographical details about the sitter of this portrait, Erycius Puteanus (1574 – 1646): “Historian, humanist and philologist from the Netherlands; studied at Dordrecht and Cologne. Professor at University of Leuven” (http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/search_the_collection_database/term_details.aspx?bioId=110695). The curator of the BM also advises that the “portrait is based on Van Dyck's chalk and brush drawing” held in the British Museum (see 1895,0915.1069: http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=712177&partId=1&searchText=+R,1a.258&page=1) and that the copper printing plate for this print “is kept in the Chalcographie, Musée du Louvre, inv.no.2388” (see BM no. R,1a.258).

After looking at Van Dyck’s preparatory chalk and brush study for this portrait (see URL above) showing the sitter (Puteanus) facing to the right (rather than the mirror image of his position in Pieter de Jode’s engraving) I wonder how many other viewers perceive a difference in the projected meaning separating the two compositions. What I mean by this is that in Van Dyck’s original composition with the sitter facing right, I see the man as being slightly secretive—as if he is trying to conceal what his fingers are "bookmarking”. Going further, I read Van Dyck's original composition as showing the sitter caught in a specific moment of being interrupted in what he is doing. By contrast, in Pieter de Jode’s engraving, I see the man as exhibiting a contemplative mindset—reflecting upon a meaningful thought with his fingers lightly holding a reference point in the book in a timeless moment.

Of course, the idea that an academic figure should hold a book is a simple visual device to signify the sitter’s intellectual background—the same way that portrayed saints are signified by the attributes that they carry. What is interesting to consider with the simple device of showing Puteanus with his book is how much additional meanings are projected by which direction he faces, how many fingers he inserts into the book and how “well used” the book appears.