INTERPOLATIONS IN HEGEL. CHRISTMAS 1984. SIGNED & DEDICATED BY FINLAY.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1984
14 x 9.7cm, 48pp (printed recto only) and printed white wrappers.
Artist's book with 16 quotations from Hagel paired with other classical and modern quotations from Hereclitus, Wittgenstein, Zeno, Coleridge, Pythagorus and Finlay himself. The conjoining of the tests brings new meaning to the Hegelian bon mots. This was a Christmas publication from the Press which was often sent out as gifts to friends and colleagues - this copy has a handwritten dedication "Stuart from Ian as always". VG+.

TABLE TALK OF IAN HAMILTON FINLAY. 1985. ONE OF 150 NUMBERED COPIES.

London: Barbarian Press, 1985
32 x 21cm, 12pp (rough edged paper) plus card covers and printed dustjacket. Letterpress printed. Artist;s book which has 80 epigrams and aphorisms by Finlay on a wide range of issues. There are four on concrete poetry, for instance,:

The Muse of concrete poetry reverse Mnemosyne's gift: depriving the poet of song, she gave him sweet eyesight.

Concrete poetry was less a visual than a silent poetry.

The conrete poets regarded language itself as rhetorical.

COncrete poems were thought childish because they were seen but not heard."

This is a charming and musing book with no central theme so can be dipped into at random. It was one of only 150 numbered copies. VG+.
Strangely Murray has this book twice in his catalogue raisonne - once in 1981 (which is erroneous) and again in 1985 - which is correct.

EPICURUS AT CHATOU. 1985. ONE OF 150 SIGNED & NUMBERED COPIES.

Firenze: Exempla/Exit Lugo 1985
8.9 x 31.7cm, 28pp (printed recto only) and printed white wrappers with printed dustjacket.
Artist's book with 8 colour typographic works by Finlay and Ron Costley. The texts are word combinations such as SEAPINK or STRAWBERRYCAMOUFLAGE- which have multiple meanings in part because of the lack of any spaces between the words. The works reproduced here were all released as much larger edition prints by the Wild Hawthorn Press but this book was an edition with Maurizio Nannuci in Italy himself a well known concrete and experimental poet (and artist). This is one of the deluxe copies - 150 signed and numbered by Finlay by hand in greem ink. VG+.

4 BLADES. 1986.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1986
7.6 x 8cm, printed outer folder content of six 7.6 x 8cm, 1pp cards. Each card has a drawing of a guillotine blade by Hincks with a quotation on it such as:
"The government of the Revolution is the despotism of liberty against tyranny. Terror is an emanation of virtue."
by Robespierre. Other quotes are from Denis Diderot, Nicolas Poussin and from Finlay himself who writes:
"Terror is the piety of the Revolution".
Finlay saw The Terror as in some sense pure - which was not an acceptance of the acts of the despots but a metaphysical impression of the firm beliefs of the Terrorists as being virtuous. The guillotine is often an image used in Finlay's works that stands for that purity as well as the fear and evil of man. VG+.

HERECLITIAN VARIATIONS. 1986.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1986
11 x 9cm, 20pp plus overside printed card wrappers. Quotations from Hereclitus are used to illuminate the missile attack on HMS Sheffield on 4 May 1982. The classical words all regard the transformation of water and air into fire - which ends with the quote "Exocet steers all." which is the line about Zeus - "Lightning steers all" but with the name of the missile replacing the God's weapon of choice. Finally a polarised image of the horrific attack on the warship is reproduced in b/w. VG+.

NEW ARCADIANS NR 23. DESPATCHES FROM THE LITTLE SPARTAN WAR. 1986

Leeds: New Arcadians, 1986
21 x 15cm, 44pp plus wrappers. A single number of this poetry and literature review - here dedicated to a long essay (by Finlay) explaining the background to the Little Spartan war. B/w photographs throughout. While a number from a journal we regard this as an artist's book. VG+.

THOUGHTS ON WALDEMAR. 1986.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1986
5.5 x 8.6cm, printed outer folder content of sixteen 5.5 x 8.6cm, 1pp cards printed black on deep blue. Each card is attack of the hack art critic Waldemar Januszczak who had upset the poet by giving him a poor review (Finlay also fell out with the priggish and ignorant Brian Sewell for which I love the poet even more). The cards all attack with vigour the Guardian' pet critic - "Being outspoken was his claim to shame" is one example. Finlay wounds. Januszczak later tried to retaliate with his own cards (see elsewhere in this collection for those items) but all they did was to parody Finlay's style of attack and frankly failed to hit the target (one has an image of a man giving a Hitler salute - actually taken from early Anselm Kiefer - which is crass). These cards are in VG+ condition in like folder.

DETACHED SENTENCES ON WEATHER. 1986. ONE OF 200 COPIES

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1986
18.3 x 12cm, 20pp and card covers along with flower pattern dust jacket and printed tipped on label. The full title of the book is "Detached Sentences on Weather In The Manner of William Shenstone".
Shenstone was not only an 18th century poet but also an influential early estate gardener. The texts are a series of aphorisms by Finlay which are presumably in the style of the earlier poet and all consider the importance of the weather - a subject very important to both gardeners and British people. Two examples of these sayings are:

"The Late Night Shipping Forecast is a kind of High Church Weather Service for radio listeners."
Or
"The Greeks before Troy feared hostile weather as much as hostile Trojans."

One of only 200 such books printed at Christmas as presents to friends and colleagues. Two small vignettes by Jo Hincks. VG+.

LOAVES. 1987.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1987
7.1 x 10.5cm, 8pp and card covers along with printed brown dust jacket. The artist's book has a visual poem:

cottage
loaves

loaf
cottages

and there is a drawing by Howard Eaglestone and a photo-montage by Antonia Reeve.
The texts by reversing the words create first an image of squat country houses (brown and russet red as when painted by Paul Cezzane) and then a loaf with the shape of a solid loaf. The illustrations reflect those two poetic images. VG+.

SWASTICA. 1988

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1988 12.5 × 10cm, 8pp plus wrappers and printed red dust jacket. Artist book with three definitions for the word ‘swastika’ which show the symbolism can have different meanings and not all negative - Finlay has dedicated to Stephane Paoli, Catherine Millet and Michel Blum who all stupidly accused Finlay of being a Nazi when they saw an anti-fascist artwork which included a swastika. VG+. Very scare publication.

A COUNTRY LANE. 1988.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1988
15.5 x 10.6cm, 24pp with 4pp light green end papers, card covers and printed dust jacket. The full title of the book is "A Country Lane with Stiles" and explains Finlay's putative "country lane" which was expected to be a major installation in the 1988 Glasgow Garden Festival. However Finlay withdrew his involvement in the Festival in protest at the Strathclyde Region's dispute with him over the Garden Temple.
The lane was to be a metaphoric peon to De Stijl the modernist Dutch art movement and Finlay lists the flowers and trees that were to be planted. The rest of the book are poetic considerations of stiles illustrated by Laurie Clark.

STILES 1
Thesis: fence.
Anti-thesis: gate.
Synthesis: stile

One of 500 printed. VG+. Not in Murray's catalogue raisonne.

A CONCISE CLASSICAL DICTIONARY. CHRISTMAS 1988. ONE OF ONLY 250 COPIES.

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1988
31.4 x 22cm, 52pp plus card covers and dustjacket. A series of "definitions", one of Finlay's innovations in experimental poetry where a word is given an alternative meaning by the addition of a classical or modern quotation. For example:

PATCH, n.
1. A whole part.
The trousers and jumpers of men vary in hue from the brightest orange vermilion to the palest rose pink, and are decorated with every imaginable sort of PATCH.
Peter Anson, The Breton Sardine Fisheries.

As we have noted elsewhere Finlay regards a patch as a symbol of warm, caring as well as poverty.
Slight bumping to corners of the book - else VG+. One of 250 copies published at Christmas 1988.

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