Search Results: Titles starting with M from Bookvica

Tbilisi: Sp'etsdanishnulebis izoliat'oris (met'ekhis) k'ult'-k'omisiis ga-ma, 1928. 24 pp.: ill. 26x17 cm. In original wrappers with letterpress design. Tears of the spine with small losses, soiling of the covers, water stain on the lower margin throughout the copy, otherwise very good internally. This is a unique survival of the time - the Georgian magazine published in Metekhi prison. The only issue was printed. One of 1000 copies produced. According to the National Library of Georgia, the edition was banned. Cover design and illustrations were produced by convicted artist E. Kurmakher, photographs made by G. Tokhadze who was a photographer of Georgian Goskinoprom. Metekhi has been originally built in V century AD. Throughout the centuries it has been one of the most important churches in Tbilisi. Being the prison from the early 19th century, Metekhi castle was the main 'politizoliator' in the Soviet Georgia where the political prisoners were contained, in particular, Mensheviks who led… Read More

48 pp. 25x18 cm. In original illustrated wrappers. An issue of a mass non-fiction magazine on radio engineering and amateur technics published with this title in 1930-1941. It continued a periodical 'Radio for Everybody' (1925-1930) and its successor 'Radio' had been coming out up to the 21st century. Just like cinema, radio became a mass medium and was being introduced everywhere. Radio became a symbol of the future, but it was understood differently. For instance, Lenin spoke about it as an advanced periodical, "newspaper without paper and distances". Velimir Khlebnikov wrote, "radio will inaugurate new ways to cope with our endless undertakings and will unite all mankind" in his utopian manifesto 'Radio of the Future' (1921). It truly connected rural areas with cities, was a tool of announcements, mass broadcasting and a powerful channel of culture and enlightenment. In kolkhozes, receivers for reading rooms were installed for free. Peasants were provided credits for purchase. Thanks to the… Read More

Moscow: Zhurgazob'edinenie, 1934. 48 pp.: ill. 25x17 cm. In original illustrated wrappers. Spine chipped, tear of upper edge of front cover and following three leaves, water stain on upper edge of most pages, otherwise very good. Issue of mass non-fiction magazine on radio engineering and amateur technics published under this title in 1930-1941. It continued a periodical 'Radio for Everybody' (1925-1930) and its successor 'Radio' has been coming out up to this day. Its laconic design shows a two-color combination of a red silhouette of the Spasskaya Tower of the Kremlin and the large image of the Shukhov Tower as the symbols of old and new heights of Russian culture. Just like cinema, radio became a mass medium and was being introduced everywhere. Radio became a symbol of the future, but it was understood differently. For instance, Lenin spoke about it as an advanced periodical, "newspaper without paper and distances". Velimir Khlebnikov wrote, "radio will inaugurate new ways to cope with our… Read More

St. Petersburg: Izdaniye T-va A.F. Marks, 1911. 72, [2] pp., 1 folding plate, 4 tables: ill. 23.8x16.4 cm. In original illustrated publisher's wrappers. Soiling and light foxing of the wrappers, spine slightly rubbed, rear wrapper and 2 tables lack small pieces (no text affected). Otherwise in a good condition. Scarce. Fourth edition. First, second, and third editions published in 1909, 1910, and 1911 respectively. ONE OF THE FIRST COMPREHENSIVE RUSSIAN MANUALS ON SHOEMAKING. This fourth edition of the ABC of shoemaking at home was printed by Alexandra Shulgovskaya (1840-1918) in 1911. The publication was intended to fill a large gap in technical literature, in which there was not a single manual for affordable shoemaking (Shulgovskaya, preface). In the book, the author offers a detailed review of the updated shoemaking process that implied complete abandonment of sewing, and instead suggested the use of nails. The handbook elucidates each and every step of the art of shoemaking from taking foot… Read More

Moscow: Iskusstvo, 1940. 48 pp., 32 ills. 18x15 cm. In original cloth folder with silver lettering and blind debossed silhouette: text brochure and separate illustration leaves inside. Folder is slightly soiled, small tear of the spine of the text brochure with minor tear of the t.p. outer edge, some foxing, otherwise very good and clean copy. First and only edition. Rare. Folder design by M. Vil'ker. One of three manuals on how to apply stage makeup compiled by Nikolai Novlianskii (1891-1966). He was an actor of Moscow Kamerny theater, a master of stage makeup. Apart from this handbook, he published two books in 1930 and 1945. The first one was an album 'Art of Makeup' and the size of this particular edition is much smaller. However, it contains extensive text explanations and a lot of illustrations. These model makeups were, probably, more useful as far as an actor could carry some separate leaves he really needed before a certain performance. It starts with a skull structure and face muscles.… Read More

Moscow: Izd-vo Budetlian, 1915. 32 pp.: ill. 23x19 cm. Original illustrated wrappers. Small tears of the spine but otherwise a very good copy. Very rare. One of 450 copies printed. First edition. This book is the only known collaboration of three key figures of Russian avant-garde - Kazimir Malevich, Alexei Kruchionykh and Ivan Kliun. Includes three сonstructivist illustrations by Kliun, of which one is on the cover. All three have contributed to the text. The main motive of the publications are the condemnation of the classic art and the proclamation of the avant-garde. Cubo-futurist Ivan Kliun who was inspired by Malevich included his own manifesto 'The Primitives of XXth century'. Malevich's own article includes the thoughts on the fourth dimension. He states: «I warn you about the danger: nowadays the mind seized the art in the 4-dimension box and I ran away foreseeing the danger of 5th and 6th dimension. The 5th and 6th dimension will create a cube where art will choke». This has to do with… Read More

Leningrad: Izd. Leningr. akad. Malogo oper. teatra, 1937. 47 pp.: ill. 30x22.5 cm. In original illustrated publisher's wrappers. Tears of the spine and extremities, otherwise good. Scarce. First edition. 1 of 4,200 copies. A COLLECTION OF ARTICLES DEDICATED TO THE PRODUCTION OF MIKHAIL SHOLOKHOV'S VIRGIN SOIL UPTURNED AT THE STATE ACADEMIC MALY OPERA THEATRE IN LENINGRAD. A Nobel Prize winner, Mikhail Sholokhov (1905-1984) was one of the world's foremost modern writers. His novel Podnyata tselina [i.e. Virgin Soil Upturned], dealing with the collectivization of the countryside in the USSR, was first published in 1932 and has been translated into 75 languages and printed in over thirty million copies. In 1937, twenty years after the October Revolution, the Soviet composer Ivan Dzerzhinsky (1909-1978) was commissioned by the Leningrad Maly Opera Theatre to write the opera Virgin Soil Upturned based on Sholokhov's novel. To get acquainted with the songs of the Don Cossacks, the composer visited the… Read More

Kostroma: Krasnyi pechatnik, 1924. 56 pp. 18,5x14 cm. In original printed wrappers. Pale water stains on front cover and upper margin of first leaves, otherwise very good and clean internally. First edition. One of 3000 copies. This is a curious provincial edition promoting collective dwelling and behavior. It was much more than anti-capitalist propaganda. This small, nondescript book became a tribune for socialist dreams. The Kostroma-based author, Mikhail Shchekin had written a range of books on the new lifestyle and sexual health issues - and his editions were banned (probably for Trotskyism). Other curious books by him are 'Anti-Religious Table Book' (1924) and 'Patterns and Norms of Sexual Life' (1925). This work drew attention to the front of the daily routine and changes the Soviet people needed to implement. Shchekin suggested kitchen factories and nurseries, as well as a new type of houses: one-floor, with windows and doors on the roofs, that was supposed to be co-build in a long tape for… Read More

Moscow: Izd-vo Akademii nauk SSSR, 1941. 44 pp. 22x15 cm. In original printed wrappers. Slightly rubbed, with some creases, otherwise very good. First and only edition. One of 3000 copies. The earliest Soviet identification guide of world's languages written by eminent Russian linguist, Semitics scholar Nikolai Iushmanov (1896-1946). He graduated from Petrograd University as an Arabist, then taught in a range of universities. Among them was the Institute of Language and Thinking named after N. Marr. In the 1920-1950s, Marr's pseudo-scientific Japhetic theory applying the class struggle to linguistics was highly accepted by the Stalinist government. Under Marr's influence, Iushmanov developed some of his studies as well. Iushmanov is considered the founder of the Russian studies of the Arabic language, in particular, he is the author of three grammars of the Arabic language. For the first time in Russia, he studied the Amharic language and the Hausa language, and proposed an original concept for the… Read More

St. Petersburg: Prakticheskaya meditsina, 1912. With 49 ills. 126 pp. 23,3x17 cm. In contemporary binding. Bound together with 6 other Russian medical papers of the time. The first edition of this book by the founder of Russian radiation therapy Polien Grigorievich Mezernitskiy (1878-1943). In 1909 he was working alongside Marie Curie. Radium was synthesized in 1910 and this book is the first one in Russian dedicated to the element, describing it from the medical point of view. In Russian radium was synthesized only in 1921. The second half of the book dedicated to the examples of the use of radium in different therapy with authors remarks on where else it could be used. Not in the Worldcat.

Yerevan: GIZ, 1932. 102 pp. 1 of 4000 copies. 21x15 cm. In original illustrated wrapper. Wrapper is rubbed at the edges, soilings, bits of the spine are missing. Cover design by Martiros Saryan. Rare example of the book design by the founder of Armenian national school of painting. WorldCat locates two copies.

Moscow: Co-operative publ. soc. of foreign workers in the USSR, 1932. 32 pp. In original illustrated publisher's wrappers. Minor stain on outer edge of pages throughout copy, spine slightly rubbed, otherwise very good and clean. First English edition. Scarce. Translated by the schoolteacher and socialist William Wheeldon (1893-1937) from the original Russian Vosstaniye na bronenostse 'Potemkin' [late 1920- early 1930s]. A vivid example of the Soviet propaganda directed towards foreign population of the USSR in the early 1930s. Both the author of the book, Semen Kanatchikov, and the translator, William Wheeldon, became the victims of the Soviet repressions and were executed during the great purge five years after the book was published. The Revolt on the Armoured 'Cruiser Potemkin', was issued by the Co-operative Publishing Society of Foreign Workers in the U.S.S.R. in 1932. The publishing house was entrusted with distributing ideological, Marxist-Leninist, educational, fiction, and reference… Read More

Leningrad: Detizdat TsK VLKSM, 1937. 10 pp.: ill. 7x6 cm. In original illustrated wrappers. Covers detached from text block and slightly soiled, spine rubbed and repaired on rear side with paper band, small rusty stains around staple, ink signature on p. 3, otherwise very good. Lifetime edition. The back cover indicates a huge printrun of 500 000 copies and it seems to be true because of the enormous popularity of the author and the artist. Despite that, copies of this small fragile book hardly survived up to the day. Miniature children's book by the magnificent duo of Marshak and Konashevich. 'The House that Jack Built' was one of the first children's books they produced together. Samuil Marshak (1887-1964) introduced his early poetry and translations to the public in the 1900s. In particular, his poems were published in magazines 'Jewish Life' and 'Young Judea'. As a Jew, Marshak was denied admission to universities. In 1912, he enrolled at the University of London and simultaneously started to… Read More

Convolute of two works on mathematical analysis: Tikhomandritskiy, M. Kurs teorii konechnykh raznostey [i.e. The Course of Calculations of Finite Differences]. Kharkiv: D.N. Poluekhtov, 1890. [2], III, V, 274 pp. Markov, A. Ischislenie konechnykh raznostey [i.e. Calculations of Finite Differences]. Complete in two parts. Part 1. Interpolirovanie [i.e. Interpolation]. St. Petersburg: Academy of Science press, 1889. [4], 121, [1] pp. Part 2. Uravneniya v konechnykh raznostiakh i summirovanie [i.e. Equations in Finite Differences and Summation]. St. Petersburg: Academy of Science press, 1891. 124 pp. 23x16,2 cm. Contemporary half-leather binding. Gilt lettering on the spine. Top of the spine is missing, otherwise a good copy. First editions both. Matvey Tikhomandritskiy (1844-1921) was the professor of pure mathematics in Kharkiv at the university. This is one of his main works. As it was printed locally it's quite rare. Worldcat locates two copies at Brown and Stanford Universities. Andrei Markov… Read More

Moscow: Krasnyi mayak, 1924. 8 pp.: ill. 65x54 cm. Very good. A very fragile newspaper with tears of the extremities and spine, ink stamp of the non-existing library (Lenin's institute). An extremely rare survival of the time. Page 8 with advertisements including an illustrated ad for ABC with poem by Vladimir Mayakovsky (1893-1930). Mayakovsky started to work in advertising in 1922 and continued till his death. The greatest number of ad texts created by him falls on period from 1923 to 1925. He wrote texts for lea ets, newspaper ads, advertising posters, candy, wrappers, cookie boxes, etc. His views on Soviet advertising, to which he attached great agitational and political signi cance, Mayakovsky expounded in the article of 1923 'Agitation and Advertising': ''We know perfectly the power of agitation. In every military victory, in every economic success, nine tens comes from the skill and strength of our agitation... Advertising is industrial, commercial agitation... We must not abandon this… Read More

Moscow: Gos. izd., 1921. 70 pp. 13.6x18 cm. In original publisher's wrappers. Light soiling of the wrappers, private library stamp on the front wrapper, title-page, p. 3, and p. 25. Otherwise near fine. Rare. First edition. One of 5,000 copies. SCARCE LIFETIME EDITION OF THE FUTURIST POETRY BY VLADIMIR MAYAKOVSKY. One of the most active supporters of the October Revolution, Mayakovsky dedicated his satirical poem, 150.000.000, to the new Socialist culture and society. The work was written during the American intervention in the Russian Civil War (1919-1920) and was intended to hail the 150-million-strong Russian people's mission in the struggle against capitalist evil and, namely, the American president Woodrow Wilson. After reciting fragments of the poem at the opening of the All-Russian Union of Poets Club in Moscow (March 5, 1920), the author read the full text on the 4th and the 20th of December of the same year, at the Petrograd House of Arts and Polytechnic Museum in Moscow, respectively.… Read More

Moscow: Gos. izd, 1921. 70 pp. 13.6x18 cm. In original publisher's wrappers. Light soiling of the wrappers, private library stamp on the front wrapper, title-page, p. 3, and p. 25. Otherwise near fine. Rare. First edition. One of 5,000 copies. Scarce lifetime edition of the futurist poetry by Vladimir Mayakovsky. One of the most active supporters of the October Revolution, Mayakovsky dedicated his satirical poem, 150.000.000, to the new Socialist culture and society. The work was written during the American intervention in the Russian Civil War (1919-1920) and was intended to hail the 150-million-strong Russian people's mission in the struggle against capitalist evil and, namely, the American president Woodrow Wilson. After reciting fragments of the poem at the opening of the All-Russian Union of Poets Club in Moscow (March 5, 1920), the author read the full text on the 4th and the 20th of December of the same year, at the Petrograd House of Arts and Polytechnic Museum in Moscow, respectively. The… Read More

Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe izdatel'stvo, 1930. 78, [2] pp.: ill. In original constructivist wrappers. Spine restored, small pale stains on front cover, otherwise very good and clean. First and lifetime edition. One of 5000 copies. Cover design by artist Alexander Surikov (1907-1946), one of newly discovered designers of the 20-30s. He was a remarkable artist and constructor of Soviet books who impeccably felt the style. In book graphics, Surikov worked from 1928 and was fond of complex compositions and constructivist design solutions until 1934. He started to work in 'Nizhpoligraph' [Nizhny Novgorod printing shop], then moved to Moscow and contributed to editions of central publishing houses. The play 'Bathhouse' was commissioned by Vsevolod Meyerhold for his theater in 1929. Despite that, its debut occurred on stage at the Leningrad Drama Theater of the State People's House in January 1930. Two months later, the Meyerhold Theater performed 'Bathhouse'. It was too witty; the performance caused a… Read More

Petrograd: Parus, 1917. 48 pp. In original publisher's wrappers. Front cover detached from block, otherwise very good and clean copy. The first separate edition of Mayakovsky's poem The War and The World, which became the culmination of the author's anti-war pathos. The outburst of World War I received contradictory reactions in the Russian literature of the 1910s. In the works of Vladimir Mayakovsky, the topic of warfare began to appear from 1914. His poems Mama i ubityy nemtsami vecher [i.e. Mother and the Evening the Germans Killed] (1914) and Ya i Napoleon [i.e. Napoleon and Me] (1915) expressed the horrors of war and condemned the bloodshed. In spite of radical approach to WWI, Mayakovsky was distinguished with the sharp patriotic enthusiasm, which with the course of time gradually waned. In early September 1915, Vladimir joined the Petrograd military automobile school where he was employed as a 'skillful and experienced draftsman'. It was at the military school that Mayakovsky's will to join… Read More

Leningrad: Gosizdat, 1925. 94, [1] pp. 17,2x13 cm. In original printed wrappers with constructivist design on the front wrapper (and in a later full cloth case with lettering in Swedish). Very good, loss of the small fragment of the margin of the back wrapper, spine is rebacked with paper, owner's notes in ink (front wrapper) and pencil (t.p. and dedication l.), ink stamps on the t.p. (Swedish bookshop and VOKS), generally slightly rubbed. First edition. One of 10000 copies. Rare. Cover designed E. Shol'te. Vladimir Ilyich Lenin is an epic poem by Vladimir Mayakovsky written in 1923-1924. Mayakovsky started working upon the poem called originally just ''Lenin'' soon after the funeral (the death and funeral which he attended made a profound impression upon the poet), then took a break. Mayakovsky's elder sister Lyudmila remembered: ''Volodya took Lenin's death very personally. For him it was like the loss of a dear, close person. He believed in him. He loved him from those early days of working in… Read More