Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám Edward FitzGerald

London: Hodder & Stoughton, [1913]. Large quarto. Full vellum elaborately blocked in gilt and blue to a design by René Bull, with gilt lettering to the spine and upper cover. Top edge gilt, others untrimmed. Printed by Henry Stone & Son, Banbury. Limited to 250 copies signed and numbered by the artist, this being No. 216. Edward FitzGerald's Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám found one of its most luxurious Edwardian interpretations in this edition illustrated by René Bull. Combining Persian and Byzantine motifs with Art Nouveau design, Bull's imagery brings an opulent theatricality to Khayyám's meditations on fate, love, and mortality. The volume contains ten mounted colour plates within decorative gilt borders, nineteen full-page line drawings, and tissue guards printed with the accompanying quatrains. Bull, trained in Paris and influenced by both Beardsley and Dulac, captures in these pages the final flowering of the Golden Age of British book illustration. His richly detailed compositions unite the mysticism of Persian art with the fin de siècle fascination for the East. The binding remains bright and well preserved, the vellum clean with only light toning and the gilt still radiant. Internally there is scattered spotting to the endpapers and prelims, as is usual for this edition, but the plates are fresh and unfaded. A complete and very good copy of the signed limited issue. An outstanding example of one of the most beautiful illustrated books of the Edwardian era - a union of FitzGerald's timeless verse and René Bull's sumptuous vision.