CRITE, Allan Rohan

Artist's Original Mock-Up Book of "Negro Spirituals Illustrated"

Folio. Handbound in muslin over boards. Bound into the book are six full-page pen and ink drawings: 1. study of a titlepage "Negro Spirituals Illustrated" depicting a man, two children and an angel; 2. Fully finished drawing of the same subject; 3. Drawing of Moses, also labeled "Negro Spirituals Illustrated"; 4. table of contents page with the contents flanked by drawings of the man, Moses, and the angel; 5. Moses holding a black child labeled "Go Down Moses"; and 6. drawing of the man and an angel labeled "Steal Away to Jesus." Also two calligraphically hand-drawn pages of music; and seven typed and hand-corrected pages of text. Not least important are the presence of numerous photo-mechanically reproduced proofs from drawings that are not represented in the book, and which might represent the only surviving images of these drawings. Crite was a New Jersey-born Boston artist best known for his religious and spiritual images. These images are very much in the style of Crite's best-known book: Three Spirituals From Earth to Heaven (Harvard University Press, 1948), which illustrated the spirituals "Nobody Knows the Trouble I See," "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," and "Heaven." These drawings may have been either rejected from that volume, or existed to form the basis for a never realized sequel. Rare.

[BTC #90387]