[Black Sun Press] Grosz, George. Interregnum

Paris: The Black Sun Press, 1936. First edition, letter H of 20 lettered hors commerce copies, for William Jacob Peabody, Caresse Crosby's son. Folio. Introduction by John Dos Passos. Title-page and text printed in black and in red; List of Plates sheet, loose as issued. Illustrated with color lithographed frontispiece signed by Grosz in pencil and 64 lithograph plates. Publisher's quarter red cloth over imitation wooden board folding case, printed in red, extremities rubbed and lightly worn, scattered light soiling, spine ends frayed; text leaves bound at front hinge and plates loose, as issued; original printed prospectus and two other pieces of ephemera laid in. Minkoff A-44

A fine presentation copy to William Jacob Peabody (1916-55), Caresse Crosby's son from her first marriage, to Richard Rogers Peabody.

In the early 1930s, Caresse Crosby set out to Berlin "to search out George Grosz" whose drawings she admired. (Crosby, The Passionate Years, p. 284). Upon visiting his "heavenlit garret" studio, they struck up the idea for a book featuring Grosz's satiric drawings chronicling the emergence of Nazism in the years between 1928-32. "He was excited, but not so sure of me. Indeed, I was a bolt from the blue or perhaps from the black--he would of course have to check with his dealer, but confessed that he very much wanted to illustrate Hemingway. He asked me if I couldn't arrange it with Hemingway, but I was not so sure of Hemingway. We promised to write each other, and I blew out as unexpectedly as I had blown in...That book of drawings did not materialize immediately, but it was finally accomplished in New York in 1934--Interregnum, eighty (sic) lithographs by George Grosz with reproductions by George Miller, printed by Joseph Blumenthal, introduction by John dos Passos...and edited by Caresse Crosby--it won the Graphic Arts prize as one of the fifty best books of the year--a tribute to those four geniuses whom I had so successfully bound together." (Crosby, p. 285).

Although this work was planned for a print run of 300 copies, only 42 copies were ever printed, including two artist's proofs.

[Black Sun Press] Grosz, George. Interregnum