a gift

I was doing some pretty intense vacuuming the other day (that's right, intense) and I came upon this pretty thing under my bed and decided it deserved it's own post.

It's a book that was printed in 1885. It is one of my favorite things that I own and I keep it hidden under my bed and covered with a towel. This book is well over 100 years old now and I am terrified to even open it. The binding is so fragile I wonder how many more times it can be opened before it falls apart. Every page has oil and ink smudges left by past readers and I'm afraid to add more to it. But, I still can't help but look through it from time to time.

 There are about 12 summaries of Shakespeare plays in this book, each with an illustration.

Every one is like a work of art and the colors are still very bright. The pictures really are the star of the show, which makes sense since this book was supposed to be for children. What strikes me as odd for a children's book is exactly which scenes they chose to illustrate from each play.

Bloody ghosts of murder victims.

 Insanity. Don't worry kids she'll drown in the next scene.

I somehow made it through high school without reading Othello, but I'm pretty sure this sad, pretty lady ends up being smothered with a pillow shortly after this accusatory point.

Shakespeare definitely dealt with a lot of dark themes and they didn't candy coat if for the kids reading this book. I'm not complaining or anything. Most original fairy tales are rather dark. When I was a kid my two favorite animated movies to watch were The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and The Little Mermaid. And not the Disney The Little Mermaid. It was an anime version where the heroine creeps into the prince's bedroom at night to murder him and when she can't bring herself to do it, dies and turns into sea foam.

I feel like I'm getting off track here. Back to the book. I received it as a high school graduation gift from a friend of my family's. I was a bit embarrassed to receive a gift like this since I felt it was too much and I didn't even really know the person that gave it to me very well. Every family member I had was writing me a check for $20 and a man I hardly knew was giving me a beautiful antique. All I knew about him was that to 17 year old me, he was the most fascinating man alive. He was an author who designed his own house. He grew up in the Netherlands and lived there during the Nazi invasion. He played an accordion at our Christmas party. He was amazing and this book just punctuated that amazingness. He passed away five years ago. Whenever I see this book, it reminds me of him and I can remember only great things about him. That's a pretty good epitaph.