After all these years, it's nice to come across something new in an old book. Or, in this case, strange. Case in point: user Keef shared something of interest in our forum a few weeks ago about an obvious printing error in an edition of The Figure in the Shadows (1975):
It's got the library binding with the white cloth, and it's price-clipped as such, but there are no pockets or spine tape; just a simple rubber stamp on the title page. You'll notice that I didn't say the first page; because the first page is page 67 (see image)! The first signature of the book was misprinted, with the obverse and reverse of the pages not matching. The numbering is correct after page 27; page 26 is not included, and neither is the indicia page, so I don't know what printing this is. Also, AFTER that initial signature, everything is correct-- so all those pages from the front are ALSO in the back, printed twice within the same book.
While I've encountered typos, I've never seen something as outright wrong as this. Do other copies of this exist, or is the only evidence of a print run long ago pulped? Any thoughts on this being a library edition?
1 comment:
My question would be, what page numbers were included in that first signature? Was just one side of the signature incorrect, or were all of the pages out of place? I have seen misprints before that had one side incorrect. In that case a sheet printed on one side is put back into the press when the wrong back pages are being printed. This is not an uncommon error in the printing world. I have had books with the entire back side of a signature printed blank. I say printed because you could see the impression of the type, but no ink. I have had books with two of the same signature and one different signature missing. These books are fairly uncommon because they are usually scrapped or thrown away when found.
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