Here and There

Here and There

W. Somerset Maugham, book's author

Tokyo: Kinseido Ltd.

1955

Megan Lepak researched and wrote the event description in 2018.

For a description of the book, please click on the image of the event label/description or scroll to the bottom of the page for the section entitled "Text" for a transcription of the attached document.

Literature

SPECIAL PR6025 .A86 H44162 1955

English and Japanese, book's contents
English, event description

This book has another record in the "Beautiful Books" Lobby Exhibit Collection.
To see this book on November 15, 2018 in the "Event Photographs" Collection, please go here [Photograph of Books] IMG_0581.

Transcript of event description:

HERE AND THERE | W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM | TOKYO KINSEIDO LTD. | 1955

As an extremely rare copy of a Japanese edition of American Maugham’s tome, this book is an interesting addition to this event as it represents mid-20th century American-occupied Japan. As this text is a line-by-line translation from English into Japanese we can only suppose that this may have been a teaching tool of English as a second language. The dust jacket features orange and white bands, clearly delineating a separation between English and Japanese characters on the front. There is also a frame around the book’s title, and a cactus with a flower can be seen at the bottom of the jacket. The dust jacket also has information naming the author and publishers of the book. The paperback cover is plain black and tan. The bands continue onto the spine and back of the book. Overall, the design is rather minimalistic, but still impactful because of the bold color choice.

The Japanese-influenced stamp for the original owner can be seen on the title page. Do you not think the Japanese typography is beautiful? The original owner’s name, Daniel Pfeifer, who wrote the gift inscription, was the brother of Mrs. Engelhardt. He lived in the Far East as an English teacher for a number of years and this book, the Indian printed books, and Japanese printed books all came from him.

This book is one of 3,000 volumes donated by Mrs. Marifrances Engelhardt after Hurricane Matthew (2016) flooded her home. About 240 books are in Special Collections. During WWII she served in Spain in the diplomatic corps and married a well-known foreign correspondent, through whom she met Ernest Hemingway and Orson Wells. Sometime after her second marriage she settled in St. Augustine. When shown a book from her collection, despite her advanced years, she remembered who in her family owned it or gave it to her, and whether or not she enjoyed reading it. Mrs. Engelhardt died on April 18, 2017.

Book / Unpublished Print Document