A few Thurber Thursdays ago I wrote about a 1977 Thurber boxed set produced in England that caught my attention. It arrived from across the seas this week; the seller even did a little bit of repair to the box (thank you, thoughtful bookseller!).
I slipped the books out of their cardboard box and let them sit on my work desk for a while. In the photo you see the bottom of the barrel of my trusty Rapidograph resting next to the pile of blank paper that greets me every morning.
Whoever designed the box as well as the book covers knew that a single Thurber drawing floating in a simple space is graphic gold.
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Thurber’s A-Z entry:
James Thurber Born, Columbus, Ohio, December 8, 1894. Died 1961, New York City. New Yorker work: 1927 -1961, with several pieces run posthumously. According to the New Yorker’s legendary editor, William Shawn, “In the early days, a small company of writers, artists, and editors — E.B. White, James Thurber, Peter Arno, and Katharine White among them — did more to make the magazine what it is than can be measured.”
Key cartoon collection: The Seal in the Bedroom and Other Predicaments (Harper & Bros., 1932). Key anthology (writings & drawings): The Thurber Carnival (Harper & Row, 1945). There have been a number of Thurber biographies. Burton Bernstein’s Thurber (Dodd, Mead, 1975) and Harrison Kinney’s James Thurber: His Life and Times (Henry Holt & Co., 1995) are essential. Website