WORKS OF GEOFFREY CHAUCER DLE 2.0

A new edition of the Chaucer huge size at 9 ¾” x 15 ¾”. $495 / 5 x $99
Limited to 600 copies.
http://www.eastonpress.com/prod/EA1/2908/WORKS-OF-GEOFFREY-CHAUCER
A leather-bound Deluxe Limited Edition of the 1721 masterpiece.

Featuring all the original illustrations.

In 1721, John Urry published what was to become a historic edition of Chaucer. Dramatically oversized and adorned with stunning illustrations, the edition helped standardize the work ascribed to the great author. Featuring The Canterbury Tales, Urry’s masterpiece was the first Chaucer edition to include three classic works. This Deluxe Limited Edition recreates that important book, including all the period artwork.

Decisions...

Still no Kelmscott though 😏

EP won't republish the Kelmscott. However, this is really quite beautiful! Quite expensive as well, but could very well be worth it. This edition is not as well known as the Kelmscott, but then again, what is?

https://chaucereditions.wordpress.com/18th-c/1721-urry-chaucer/

http://openbook.lib.utah.edu/?tag=john-urry

http://www.jstor.org/stable/42554522?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

http://brbl-dl.library.yale.edu/vufind/Record/3433414

I just got my book and thought I'd share some photos in case any of you are interested. The text has the same fading in and out and splotchy issue that The Iliad and the Odyssey DLE had. I don't know if that's because of EP necessarily or the original printing from which they are creating the facsimile (I suspect the latter in most cases but may be a combination of both). Apologies for the tight shots--I didn't want to open the book too far.

> hmsdrco2001, I can't believe that somebody would pay so much for a book and it would have fading and splotchy issues. I don't really care what kind of cover they slap on it. With all these issues and not being original facsimile I would of returned it as damaged and low quality book. Save your money and buy FS LE's, at least they still care about the quality of their LE's. EP should list all of their books as regular editions until they completely resolve their production techniques.

>6 unclesamme: I'm not really into the DLE's, so I admit some ignorance in the matter, but aren't many of these supposed to be facsimiles taken from an original copy of the text? If that is the case then this is what I would expect a text from 1721 to look like.

>Eastoner, None of the FS LE facsimiles ever had faded font and/or stains. EP just being ridiculous. I think that EP just used copying production value and did not fix text that was faded in the original, which is bad even for their regular editions, never mind LE's. You never want to reproduce faded font in any books. This only means, Horrible quality and disrespect for their customers. If this was EP's intention to reproduce the book inch by inch, they also should of reproduced all the wear and tear on the covers. Reproducing facsimile means giving you same looking book as original but without stains and fading text.

How many illustrations?

This has nothing to do with EP "being ridiculous". EP is doing a facsimile. If the FS likewise did a facsimile, it too would retain the original "splotches" and "stains". That's the nature of a facsimile.

fac·sim·i·le
fakˈsiməlē/
noun
noun: facsimile; plural noun: facsimiles

1.
an exact copy, especially of written or printed material.

If you take a look at a FS facsimile such as Poems of Thomas Gray, you will find plenty of smears and splotches and stains on the artwork. Again, that's the nature of the facsimile. If you purchase a facsimile without all that "stuff", it's simply because they were able to find a book that had no such blemishes. This facsimile is of a book from 1721, of course it will not be what many consider "perfect". Even the letterpress done back then was far from "perfect".

unclesamme, if you don't like the books you're welcome to not purchase them. Your argument "Save your money and buy FS LE's, at least they still care about the quality of their LE's" is rather demeaning, as honestly I've come to expect from very fervent FS aficionados. I assure you, most everyone here knows what they purchase and we know what a FS LE is like. I have a number of them, and no, I don't think they're "better" than EP DLEs. I admire both.

5: This book looks magnificent -thanks for the pics.

>11 unclesamme:
Here's how that came out:

>10 astropi: There is still quite a bit of variance on reproducing a facsimile. The quality and resolution of the scanning differs. As in the Norton Facsimile of Shakespeare's First Folio, a publisher can choose to utilize multiple copies of the original to make a more readable composite edition. EP's copy/printing techniques often lead to overly gray text compared to the original. One can choose to eliminate major blemishes similar to what happens when an audiotape or record is remastered. There are choices to made and as a potential buyer one can complain about a publisher's choices and chose not to buy their edition. As we've all mentioned many times before, it comes down to personal taste.

11: "Buzz off loser."
Faced against such wit and wisdom, what am I to do? Woe is me...

12: Indeed, this is how I read the statement from unclesamme: "I can say whatever I want, but if you disagree I'm going to go all angry on you".

13: Fair point. It also does come down to cost too. Remember that a FS facsimile is often 2-3 times what an EP DLE costs. Whether it's worth the price is of course subjective. Their Kelmscott "Reynard the Foxe" looks like it was just printed yesterday. Bright and colorful, don't recall seeing any "blemishes". Although again I would point out that it's far easier finding a copy of the Kelmscott than the 1721 Chaucer. Yes, of course EP could remove all/most blemishes, but it wouldn't be an exact facsimile -not that that is necessarily a bad thing, but it would certainly increase the price a great deal.

>14 astropi: "Yes, of course EP could remove all/most blemishes, but it wouldn't be an exact facsimile."

I thought the whole purpose of facsimiles is to reproduce the quaint and sometimes beautiful illustrations. Why would a publisher want to reproduce printing flaws, and why would a customer want them? Anyway, isn't there software available that will fill in broken letters and faded text at a reasonable cost? If there isn't, consider it a business opportunity!

15: One thing that the facsimiles do not have, which you often find in old books, is foxing. So foxing and any moisture damage are fortunately removed. "Blemishes" due to letterpress printing are arguably not blemishes, but I know what you mean. You could certainly bring it up to EP if you want. Myself, I find such "blemishes" pleasing, since it basically reinforces to me just how old these texts are, but of course it's not for everyone. Now, I do recall that years ago I saw a very high-quality facsimile (not by EP, I don't remember the company nor which book but it was thousands of dollars), and went so far as to even reproduce holes in the facsimile which were originally done by bookworms :O

The faded text is what makes it look bad to me. I don't mind some of the other blemishes, it gives you a feel of what the text actually looked like in 1721.

>11 unclesamme:
We have had many discussions on this forum about the "uneven" reproduction quality of Easton's DLEs. They range from outstanding to terrible, with most of them tending toward the outstanding end of the range. Many of us also collect Folios and are equally proud to read and display them, so we are well aware of the differences.

Astropi is an important contributor to the forum and a big defender of facsimiles. Although his criticism of your earlier post may have been a little too passionate, yours was over the top. Let's try to keep our opinions mellow. :-)

What I don't understand is how there's any value in staying true to any single instance of a particular volume. It is not sufficiently unique.

As kdweber pointed out, a publisher is free to create a facsimile edition sourced from multiple copies. Each copy would be a creative result from imitating some master design/concept, so from any stand point of uniqueness, intention, artistic quality, etc, it is that master design/concept that truly has value or meaning, not the original resulting product, as those were already flawed compared to the intended idea.

If one wishes to create a superior facsimile, it ought to be built with the original design in mind, not some random copy that happened to survive. By limiting their source to just one copy, EP all but ensures the result of an inferior facsimile. If multiple sources are used, the result still won't be perfect but it'll be better, since the best of each copy would be used. Better yet, OCR and digital blemish elimination could bring the final result even closer to the original design/concept.

Ultimately, I think the issue comes down to EP's lack of freedom to do the best job that they can - they are either limited by costs, a lack of vision from management, or both. Or perhaps I'm wrong, maybe people enjoy seeing the blemishes and faults owned by some random copy of whatever. But what about some other random copy's blemishes? Shouldn't those count, too?

19: It would actually be interesting to ask EP how they go about producing their facsimiles. You can certainly suggest blemish elimination. Although as you noted, perhaps there are those that would not like this. Myself, I could go either way, but as I said, I think these blemishes give the text an "old look" :)

Are we even certain that EP doesn't use multiple sources? As far as I'm concerned it is all speculation at this point. It is quite possible that the source(s) used was the best copy that was reasonably available to them.

I believe they do indeed try to find the best copy of a work they can and if they can not find a decent copy, they will not produce a facsimile.

I have to agree with >22 astropi: Astropi, since I actually talked with EP management (who called me at home knowing I was bothered) on this issue when I found an error on Les Miserables 1888 edition which was not in the 1887 edition. Management told me they always seek out the very best edition they can find and reproduce it the best they can even with original printing errors. Having purchased some original books from 1845 (Mysteries of Paris by Chapman and Hall) and original Dumas and Hugo books from the 1880s-1890s by Routledge it is quite amazing that they are able to clean them up as they do without foxing. If I had my way I would exchange all my original books for nice clean EP DLEs, all trimmed, with gilt pages, fresh leather and slip case. There is no more enjoyable reading experience!!

I can't believe that some of you guys actually praise EP for creating bad quality books. We can have a discussion all day long about it but the truth of the matter is that EP facsimiles are not originals and shouldn't have any font issues. What about most of their regular editions? They all have same issues with font. EP only cares about putting beautiful covers and this is really sad that some of you guys defending and buying books like that. I like EP books but would not buy any books with faded fonts. Bottom line, if you guys would not put pressure on EP they would never change. I want EP to be on the same level of facsimile reproduction with FS. FS would never try to justify faded fonts as their attempt to reproduce the original; (bad copy) of facsimile. If they did, it would have sounded ridiculous like EP. EP WORKS OF GEOFFREY CHAUCER is very expensive book and it should never have any fading fonts or splotchy issues. I hope that EP starts spending more money on reproducing facsimiles and not just putting in minimum for maximum profits. I can't wait for EP to take care of above issues. So, I can restart buying books from them.

>24 unclesamme: Does your opinion extend to facsimiles of medieval manuscripts, or do you make an exception for them? FS facsimiles of medieval manuscripts include all of the spots, fading, and other blemishes in the original.

>ultrarightist, Really, I own one from FS and it does not have any fading or blemishes of the original in the words you read. I'm not talking about pictures.

>24 unclesamme: For what it's worth, I completely agree with you. I returned the Jane Austen set because it was nearly unreadable in parts. The Sherlock Holmes set is slightly better, but volumes II and III suffer quite a bit as well, and it severely degrades my enjoyment of them.

At this point, the only Easton Press volumes I'm willing to take a chance on are the Heritage Press reprints - and only then those with monochrome illustrations, as Easton Press's color reproduction is nothing short of appalling - and modern novels published since 1960 or so. Any HP reprints with color illustrations or facsimiles of older books are bound to be of poor quality.

After having collected nearly 150 EP titles, I now turn to them very, very seldomly. The vast majority of my purchases are LEC, HP, and especially FS titles.

In regards to the qualtity of the reproductions of color illustrations from HP titles, I don't understand why they can't easily fix this. It's 2016. The only plausible explanation is that they're not interested in investing the minimal amount of money it would take to do a full color scan balanced for output to whatever their printer uses. But seriously, compare what's in your EP books sometime to even camera phone pictures people have taken of the LEC source. It will make you angry.

Here, allow me to do one, as I won both the EP and LEC Heart of Darkness (Conrad).

EP:


LEC:


And this isn't even a particularly egregious example!

>chrisrsprague, thank you very much. I was too lazy to take pictures of my FSLE's vs my EP Le's. Day and night, my FS LE's are of much finer production and quality. I want EP to improve ASAP since they do have at times more interesting titles than FS in LE format. I've been dealing with this problem since I started collecting EP regular editions in 2002 before they started producing LE's.
I found fading font in almost all of my EP titles. So, for now I stopped buying from EP altogether. Sad, since I've been with them for so long. As you can see, some people here might think, this was normal reproduction by looking at your pictures. I hope that EP will show more respect for their collectors, especially taking into consideration that their LE prices are skyrocketed from what they used to charge for them. Referring to the pictures you provided, no excuse for it can be given by EP just poor quality and no attention to their production process. I don't think that EP realizing that people like us no longer consider them to be producing finer book editions. It seems they want a lot of money for minimum effort. They probably think that people buy their books just for covers and all they have to do is to produce attractive, leather bound covers. Even, their archaic translations for some of their classics mean they do not want to spend any money for what they charge to make it more readable for us. I was only able to find the Aeneid with modern translation from FS. Archaic translations is another problem with EP.

>29 unclesamme: "no excuse" Really? The LEC may print direct from the stone or be hand colored with stencils. The illustrations in LEC editions are high quality because great effort and expense were made in their production. EP prices would skyrocket if they came close to reproducing the LEC. That said, the EP illustrations are quite inferior to the LEC and in many/most cases one can purchase the original LEC for less money. I'm more upset when the EP strips illustrations from the book or reduces the illustration to two tones. I've slowly been replacing my EP HP/LEC reprints with their originals.

I've never seen fading from the text in any of my EP editions (over 200). The HP/LEC reprints are, however, scanned and printed in such a way that the text is very gray. This might be what you mean when you mention fading. It's so nice to read LEC editions with their dark readable type.

>kdweber. I understand what you saying but fixing the font in their books shouldn't be the reason to raise their prices, it should be their regular practice of delivering quality product without making it more expensive. Would you buy a new car with faded interior and would you accept any excuses from car manufacturer telling you if you want new interior, with your new car, you have to pay more?

>30 kdweber: I stand by my statement. It is trivial in the year 2016 to do accurate reproductions of color illustrations, with minimal expense.

They may not quite have the pop of the LEC versions, but they can do a hell of a lot better than what they are putting out now. Most of us could do better with the equipment we have in our homes.

>30 kdweber: kdweber. Completely agree 110%.

>28 chrisrsprague: quite shocking.

32: "It is trivial in the year 2016 to do accurate reproductions of color illustrations, with minimal expense."

I take it you work in publishing? Otherwise how would you know that it's both "trivial" and "minimal expensive"? I read up on the FS and what they do to produce their LEs, and it sure seems neither trivial nor inexpensive.

> 30

Well, I can't speak for the ink and printing side of medium-mass production of books, but from a scanning and digitization side, I can create far superior scans of color images than the EP example in 28 using off-the-shelf scanning technology, likely to the point of perfectly duplicating the vividness shown in the LEC version. Given how little effort it takes, it would suggest that the only avenue for skyrocketing costs would be in the color printing step.

What if EP offered two versions of deluxe or otherwise limited books? What if they could offer a "standard" image reproduction, like what's done now for most of their works, and a "premium" image reproduction where, you know, they actually try to do a good job? In most cases, I would probably opt for the standard print since I'm into these books more for the stories but I suspect a lot of you would jump on the opportunity to snag premium prints if they were available.

I have to think that the real issue is that they are still using the plates they set up in the 1970s, which were made with 1970s technology, and are hopelessly faded as well, and they can't be bothered to update what they send off to the printer. They clearly care far, far more about the covers than the contents.

>32 chrisrsprague: I'm not even talking about their LEs. I'm talking about their Heritage/LEC reprints. Their bread and butter. 100 Greatest and all that.

I will go so far as to say that EP has by far the worst color reproductions of any books I own at any price.

>28 chrisrsprague:: That is a pretty glaring difference between the two...but for EP, whose bread-and-butter, profit-making business is in selling semi mass-market, coffee-table books (despite their limited exposure in LE's, etc.) attention to quality in reproduction values must take second place to making $$$ where devoting more resources to improving quality would (in their view) eat into profits. Only by calling them to account on this score can we be sure of their rationale for how they actually produce each title. -And good luck with that :-/

I really think the EP target market is not the kind of book collector who actually looks at their books, but the kind who buys whole swathes of books for the backdrop of a room. I know many people who have hundreds of EPs that they've never touched that are there to make a study look, well, studious. I'm not sure who buys the coffee table books but they sure seem to sell a lot of them. I'm equally unsure as to why they keep attempting to capture the serious-book-collector market - unless it's less of a real attempt and more of a marketing gimmick to make their coffee table books seem more serious so that someone who wants to buy a recovered Time Magazine about Downton Abbey can feel classy.

(Not knocking the Time Magazine special edition things - I have quite a few, but they've been grabbed while waiting in the supermarket checkout line, as is proper.)

>15 jroger1:

Fixing broken/poorly scanned letters is mostly a manual job, in my experience. I've just done the the front and rear flaps for the 1st impression Hobbit and it was tedious in the extreme (10 hours+). Obviously the quality of the original document and scan counts for a lot. In this case, my original scan was not as good as I would like (300dpi, lossy compression). Obviously a very high DPI scan from a decent source makes the job much easier.

Facsimiles are generally going to look a bit crap unless the publisher puts a lot of work into them. IMHO, EPs are generally not very well produced (in terms of the pages, not the bindings).

A facsimile should retain original printing errors, but not damage accrued through the years. It should look like the original did when new, not better than the original.

Faded fonts is just down to bad scanning and restoration (probably also a result of lazy removal of foxing). You can get away with a lot more sins that way than if you increase the contrast. Digital removal of foxing, by the way, is trivially easy.

>19 treereader:

If you OCR it, it isn't a facsimile any more. It is simply a re-typeset book. Some people will want that, but it isn't in any way a facsimile at that stage. It would also require a lot of proofing to eliminate OCR errors, particularly where the text is archaic, so spell-checking is pretty much out of the window.

> 41

Agreed...OCR means it isn't a facsimile anymore and has the potential for new proofing mistakes.

EP Mole(s): A job worth doing is worth doing well. I'd gladly pay the price increase necessitated by a decent cleanup and re-typesetting of these texts. I place no value in the questionable nostalgicism of the facsimile, especially when undesirable attributes and mistakes are blindly included. If EP wants to improve their profit margin, try making something worthy of these crazy price increases and create something that betters the original in *all* respects (not just the cover), then sit back and watch us eat it up.

>42 treereader:

I don't think you would really want to pay the price increase. an EP facsimile can be produced by someone on autopilot. OCRing, re-setting, proofing, determining what is a mistake and what isn't, etc are orders of magnitude more effort than doing a low-end facsimile (otherwise known as a "photocopy") and slapping some fancy covers on it. I very much doubt going to all that hassle would be worth the effort for works that are in the public domain anyway.

> 43

When I compare their standard product (e.g., the 100 Greatest Books Series) to any of their DLE's, such as this new Chaucer, I often struggle to see where the deluxeness comes from. Sure, it's larger and comes with a slipcase but does that justify going from $50~60 to $500? For these kinds of price increases, shouldn't we be able to expect at least some minimal cleanup of the text to be performed?

The public domain argument doesn't hold with me, either: compared to cheap paperback and free downloads, we've all paid substantial amounts of money for these types of books already, especially those going after DLE's, and I'm sure we'll continue overpaying for old texts, too. Besides, pretty much every public domain book of interest has already been OCR'ed, many already proofread, and they're available for download somewhere or another.

Couldn't EP just grab the appropriate free digital text from one of these repositories while designing a new volume, replace any scanned text with the digital version, and print anew? Heck, there's probably already a way to automate the transfer of digital documents to letterpress plates, too!

>44 treereader:

I suspect there is a reason why EP pushes so many DLEs: Huge profit margins for photocopies on nice paper with nice covers. Why would they eat into those margins by doing more work, if people keep buying the books anyway? Stop buying them and they might do a better job.

I think people tend to have short attention spans, so I'd be surprised if they can still sell all these endless largely random DLEs in another 5 years.

> 45

I think you're right on all counts. However, I haven't bought any DLE's except for, perhaps, one or two honorary DLE's that are unique or otherwise unavailable elsewhere. I prefer to encourage them in series subscriptions and Reader's Choice options, although, it doesn't seem to be helping.

45: "Why would they eat into those margins by doing more work"
As stubedoo pointed out, it's orders of more magnitude in work to "fix" every single issue in a facsimile. All that work could easily double the cost of a DLE, and then EP would have a problem because the books would not sell. They need to find a balance between cost and quality. I certainly think if you're not happy with the quality just don't purchase the book. Although I think they're great, I don't purchase that many DLEs because of the price, which I think is fair, but still expensive. Now if you really want the absolute best quality out there, you will likely need to find a company to produce one for you. There are companies out there such as Facsimile Editions
http://www.facsimile-editions.com/en/
Their books start at £2,950.00 and to up to £43,500.00. So you see, yes, prices get to be insane.

"I think people tend to have short attention spans, so I'd be surprised if they can still sell all these endless largely random DLEs in another 5 years."
I recall similar such comments made by other people on this board years ago. "EP is publishing too many DLEs, and that they're going down hill in quality since the Kelmscott, and that they will soon crash and burn." Again, that was years ago.

Anyway, this thread has gone way off course and just become more or less a bitchfest. I think it's fine to talk about quality issues and all, but I'd like to get back to the book itself.

hmsdrco2001, have you read more of the book? New thoughts on it? Are you happy you purchased it? By the way, I assume the works are The Canterbury Tales, Troilus and Criseyde, and Book of the Duchess?

Once again, astropi tells people in this forum what to discuss. astropi never learns. That sad. I say let's continue to talk about quality issues and other EP issues you guys want to talk about in this thread. I think astropi would not be getting his/her bonus from EP if he/she would not stop us from talking about real quality issues that EP faces for many years now

You guys are absolutely right in this matter. EP knows that it needs to fix these issues but for some reason their management and current publisher would not do it. EP makes tons of money to address all of their quality issues and know they have a lot of issues with their books' quality, no matter what, deluxe or regular editions Their management and publisher suck big time and EP needs to completely overhaul their upper management, production processes and quality control. I don't need "sorry calls" from their management/customer service when I spent a lot of money for a book, especially their so-called DLE editions.

>49 unclesamme: In any public online forum it is courtesy to keep threads on topic and this discussion has gone way off course as astropi pointed out. I agree with him and I would suggest starting a new thread concerning EP quality issues to garner further discussion.

>49 unclesamme: A lot of this probably stems from the fact that they're not cheifly a book publisher; they're a subsidiary of a company that sells "collectibles." I doubt they employ very many bibliophiles, but instead, many bean counters and marketing types.

This is reflected in the quality of their output.

>chrisrsprague, Agreed. Anyhow, I stopped buying from them altogether until they take it seriously and start producing real fine press books not just cheap replicas, which they call facsimiles. Funny, EP called it WORKS OF GEOFFREY CHAUCER DLE 2.0. EP has a lot of sense of humor, but no longer with my money.

I purchased FS LE facsimile of above work. When I received FS book approximately 6 months ago, I did not find any issues with faded fonts, illustrations or stains. It still available through the FS limited editions. I think EP needs to buy several FS limited and/or regular editions and use it as their sample of quality and compare it to their current DLE and limited editions. They will be very shocked to call their DLE editions DLE and may go back in producing only regular editions until they have experience and enough respect for their customers, to produce real DLE editions.

>52 unclesamme: oh how I wish I could afford the FS LE facsimiles. I had to settle for nearly pristine LEC versions of those two titles. And I adore them.


And yes, I have the matching Troilus and Criseyde, not pictured.

"Once again, astropi tells people in this forum what to discuss. astropi never learns. That sad. I say let's continue to talk about quality issues and other EP issues you guys want to talk about in this thread."

So sounds like unclesamme basically said: We're not going to discuss what you want, just what I want, so stop telling others to discuss what I don't want!

Also, apparently unclesamme has access to the EP bank account : "EP makes tons of money"

And also unclesamme knows the inner workings of EP: "Their management and publisher suck big time and EP needs to completely overhaul their upper management, production processes and quality control."

Also uncle knows all the conspiracy theories: " I think astropi would not be getting his/her bonus from EP if he/she would not stop us from talking about real quality issues that EP faces for many years now"

Seriously, go start a new thread. You're not making yourself look good in people's eyes in case you haven't noticed. It's common courtesy to not derail a thread too much, and in fact this etiquette has been around "for many years now"...

>53 chrisrsprague: I'd hardly call the LEC edition "settling". I'm not sure which FS LE is being referenced here, the Gill Canterbury Tales or the Kelmscott Chaucer but the LEC edition is certainly on a par with these if not superior in paper and printing.

>55 kdweber: I said that somewhat tongue-in-cheek. The 1934 Canterbury and 1939 Troilus are absolutely stunning in every way. I only wish they included the original Middle English on facing pages.

I don't personally think going OT on a thread is bad etiquete (or at least it isn't in most "casual" fora, and I don't think anyone would be complaining if the OT comments were more positive!), but going to to excess about how much better Folio are is possibly a bit much on an EP forum. A happy balance is probably all that is required, but one person telling people what they can and can't discuss doesn't seem to be the answer -- and Astropi does seem to be getting a bit worse in this regard, just now. I think if the same people derail every thread in the same direction, it IS a problem, but that doesn't seem to be the case here.

>56 chrisrsprague: "I only wish they included the original Middle English on facing pages"

Pick up the FS three volume 1986 edition printed by the Bath Press. I picked up a mint copy a few years ago for ~$50.

>57 stubedoo: Sure, but that's not really what's happening. All that astropi said was "I'd like to get back to the book itself" and then proceeded to ask a question about the book. Unclesamme took that as him being told that he can't offer his opinion. Furthermore, if Unclesamme wants it to be known that EP has serious quality issues, who is going to think to look into a thread titled Works of Geoffrey Chaucer DLE 2.0, I know that I wouldn't.

>58 kdweber: "Pick up the FS three volume 1986 edition printed by the Bath Press. I picked up a mint copy a few years ago for ~$50."

Was this an edition of the Canterbury Tales or an overall 'Works of Chaucer'? I'm aware of (and plan to get) FS' 3-volume CT set, but I wasn't aware of a FS overall "works" other than the very high ticket ones.

>60 St._Troy: "Was this an edition of the Canterbury Tales or an overall 'Works of Chaucer'?"

CT only. If you're after a FS "Works" your best bet is the buckram Kelmscott Chaucer for ~$300. Plenty of non-FS choices of the complete works for less. I'd recommend The Riverside Chaucer.

>61 unclesamme: "Yes, you can, disagree with me but do it in a respectful manner and without telling people here what to do or you will continue getting comments like this one."

Apparently unclesamme is the only member who is allowed to be disrespectful to others via their postings. Let's tally up some indiscretions....

>11 unclesamme: "Buzz off loser"

This one made me laugh, I don't think I've heard anyone tell someone to "buzz off" since the mid-90's?... also calling someone a "loser" isn't on my list of "Ways to Be Respectful."

>61 unclesamme: "Ohh, look poor baby, I pissed you off."

Classic. Once again, very well done indeed.

>61 unclesamme: "you have absolutely no understanding of etiquette, social skills and/or how to talk to people in this forum"

Your fondness of Astropi and professionalism is quite amazing.

>61 unclesamme: "Consider my recommendation about taking something for your mental health issues astropi as it relates to EP."

Watch out my fellow LibraryThing member's, unclesamme's inner keyboard warrior was been released!

In all serious, we should stop feeding the troll. It's very unfortunate one has invaded our formerly friendly community. Maybe Shawn can help us out with this?

>chrisrsprague, I love it. It seems like these books are in great condition too. I love that they separated them in two volumes. Easy to read and larger font can be used. Don't torture us and show some inside pictures too. Is it cloth slipcase behind the books? LEC were on the same level with FS producing books and I'm sure, illustrations are very vivid and the font is sharp. I have several LEC books and can't find any reason why they went out of business. Their books were gorgeous like this two. Instead, we ended up with EP, that are more concern to make money for their shareholders, instead of having real passion for making fine press books like LEC and FS. I want your Chaucer books on top of my FS LE. I love WORKS OF GEOFFREY CHAUCER and my Christmas present from me and to me will be Troilus and Criseyde LE from FS to match my other one. Please show more pictures, if you can. Those two volumes look brand new. You lucky. I want it. I thought that LEC letter pressed their books. Is ithat true?

>mortalalliance. I'll take it as a complement, since I was only responding to astropi's rude comments to me and other member in here about what we need to say and do. astropi started this war and I intended on finishing it. He needs to realize that this is not his site and people will express their opinions astropi want it or not. He is very sensitive about anybody criticizing EP. I understand working for EP you have to have some loyalty but most of us do not work for EP and we will say what we want to say, regardless. Astropi wants this site to become a Soviet Union. So, he can censor what people say and think about EP.

63: True indeed. Perhaps the troll will get tired over time or be "asked" to leave the group. Anyway, let's get back to topic. Probably at this point, hmsdrco2001 or anyone else that has this book is ignoring this thread, can't say I rightly blame them, but for those that own the book it would be nice to hear more thoughts on it?

>64 unclesamme:.

Yes, letterpress. Some pictures of the contents may be seen here (as well as pictures of the later version, upon which the EP standard edition is based).

https://booksandvines.com/2015/06/08/the-canterbury-tales-by-geoffrey-chaucer-19...

>astropi I'm so glad you finally realized you behaving like a troll and might consider to leave this group. You doing everybody a favor here. Good job astropi, you finally realized nobody likes you. It happens, but there are always more forums to try to force your opinion about something on everybody. Good luck.

or by the way, astropi think he knows what other people think, "Probably at this point, hmsdrco2001 or anyone else that has this book is ignoring this thread, can't say I rightly blame them, but for those that own the book it would be nice to hear more thoughts on it?" He has crystal ball on his troll desk.

This thread really blew up!



Sorry I’ve been out of the loop. I just finished a long stretch of night shifts.

To follow up with astropi, I think I’m going to keep the book. I missed out on previous treasures like the Kelmscott Chaucer which are now incredibly expensive on eBay. There are certainly some flaws with the text (in rare places, it’s completely unreadable as in the last photo), but as people have discussed here, I suspect much of this is because they are replicating text that is so old. The book has all of his works including The Canterbury Tales, Troilus and Criseyde, The Legend of Good Women, The House of Fame, and The Dreame of Chaucer (The Book of the Duchess). Almost all of the illustrations are in The Canterbury Tales section of the book with one major illustration for each tale. There are a few decorative embellishments here and there, too. It just feels like a piece of literary history to me.

I apologize for the photo spam, but just since this seemed to be a heated discussion, I thought the more photos, the better, so people can judge for themselves.





























I've looked at some of the other publishers, and the Folio limited edition prices just seem astronomical in comparison. The price of this EP DLE is itself astronomical. I've actually spoken with Nancy in customer service in the past about quality issues at EP--things like scratches and dings along the gilt page edges, bumps on the covers, etc. I was furious at the time and couldn't imagine anything like that being acceptable in any other industry. I couldn't imagine how these books were getting past whatever QA system they have in place at EP, if they even have a QA system. We had quite a heated discussion, and the end-result was that she apologized that EP would probably never be able to meet my expectations if I wanted the books to be perfect in every way. That level of quality and attention to detail would just be cost prohibitive for them as a company and us as customers. And I can see how that might be true seeing the prices of some of the Folio limited edition titles. These books are not hand made, they aren't perfect, and I'm afraid I simply can't afford books of that quality. So I had to come to some sort of inner peace about accepting the occasional flaws with Easton Press knowing that the beauty in most cases outshines those blemishes.

>69 hmsdrco2001: The last photograph does looks really bad, but if it is a rare occurrence in the book I suppose each person will have to decide for themselves if the book is still worth the price. The great thing is that EP allows returns so you really don't have much to lose. The majority of the DLEs are out of my price range the way they are and you are correct, the more cost prohibitive it becomes for EP the more cost prohibitive it will become for us the consumers.

"I've looked at some of the other publishers, and the Folio limited edition prices just seem astronomical in comparison. The price of this EP DLE is itself astronomical. I've actually spoken with Nancy in customer service in the past about quality issues at EP--things like scratches and dings along the gilt page edges, bumps on the covers, etc. I was furious at the time and couldn't imagine anything like that being acceptable in any other industry. I couldn't imagine how these books were getting past whatever QA system they have in place at EP, if they even have a QA system. We had quite a heated discussion, and the end-result was that she apologized that EP would probably never be able to meet my expectations if I wanted the books to be perfect in every way. That level of quality and attention to detail would just be cost prohibitive for them as a company and us as customers. And I can see how that might be true seeing the prices of some of the Folio limited edition titles. These books are not hand made, they aren't perfect, and I'm afraid I simply can't afford books of that quality. So I had to come to some sort of inner peace about accepting the occasional flaws with Easton Press knowing that the beauty in most cases outshines those blemishes."

>hmsdrco2001 Completely agreed. You're being very generous with EP by keeping such an expensive book with all its quality issues. I would of saved money to buy Chaucer FS LE that has absolutely no flows. It's very beautiful, has sharp font with generous spacing and gorgeous illustrations, goatskin leather and thick paper. I will be buying Troilus and Criseyde, which looks exactly like my The Canterbury Tales FSLE. Check it out on FS limited edition site. The Golden Ass and Metamorphoses LE's are also well made books by FS LE, which I would highly recommend to you.

>71 unclesamme: After purchasing both FS LEs you are looking at paying $1400, with EP you are spending $500. I'm not saying the FS editions don't look nice, but I like the EP design much better than FS. And for the price, for me at least, $1400 is an absolute deal breaker. I would happily take the EP edition with a few possible flaws and save myself $800.

>Eastoner I agree with you but $500 is still way too much for a book that has so many flows. Also, after bad experience I had with returning books to EP for different quality issues, I don't consider any of EP books to be DLE's. My business is doing well and I can afford several FS LE's at this time. As far as it goes for FS LE's, you have to really hold them in your hands and read them, to truly appreciate them. The pictures won't do them justice. I hope that one day you will treat yourself to FS LE edition.

>73 unclesamme: Glad to hear your business is doing well. I'm not really much of a DLE person, even with EP, and it's not that I can't afford them but rather I just have a hard time spending that much money on a book. It's a personal opinion of mine and I suppose everybody has their limits.

I am considering the FS Discworld books though and I'm wondering if they are going to continue publishing novels from the series. That would be a real nice collection I think.

>Eastoner, FS regular editions are made like LEC used to make them. Always sharp font and illustrations. For instance, their recent Dune and Lolita editions. I never had any faded fonts with their regular editions as well. Once, I had damaged slipcase for one of their regular editions, which they immediately replaced with the gift. I'm currently collecting their Letterpress Shakespeare, which is amazing and letters feel like 3d letters. They are hand made too but really expensive $545 plus $50 shipping. I'm DDS and glad my business is doing so well. I have to stop buying FS LE's though or I will end up reading them on the street without my house. In addition, I ran out of all of my excuses to my wife, why I'm spending so much buying books.

>5 hmsdrco2001:
>69 hmsdrco2001: Book looks great and doesn't look as bad as The Works of Homer. Curious if they had changed the limitation to 1100 as the website states it's 600 copies.

>62 kdweber:

Thanks!

I'd really love to see the original page on that really problematic one to understand whether it was just handled poorly or if the loss was so severe that there was no saving it without a bit of digital intervention. IMHO that should have been fixed by cloning letters from elsewhere; 15 minutes work.

> 69

I think EP would do well to provide a free PDF of the book, so in cases where the text is unreadable (or you simply don't want to take the book out of the house to read), you have an alternative solution available. Sure, we as customers can seek out the the digital version on our own but it would be good customer service if EP did the leg work for us.

>78 stubedoo:

https://books.google.com/books?id=lClYAAAAcAAJ&dq=%22for%20it%20ne%20may%20s...

Not the exact edition EP is printing from however...

>80 DanMat: Thanks for that.

>78 stubedoo: stibedoo it was just handled poorly very poorly by EP. Even Barnes and Noble books have better fonts and illustrations than EP. EP has better leather and in some cases thicker paper and that's it. Not too much difference to justify EP's price for their books. To me, none whatsoever.