This is a trilingual book handled with great skill, and produced with a high level of craftsmanship. Trilingual books are notoriously difficult to do, because books consist of two-, not three-page spreads. Here the problem is solved by making the Italian text primary and both the English and French secondary: one text on one page, two on the other. It is very handsomely produced. The jurors had one typographic complaint, which is that the small caps are not letterspaced, as we would wish them to be.

This is a digital book, but a very fine example of the use of this technology. The typography, quite simply, is superb. The challenge posed by the text is quite simple compared to that posed by Il Bosco dei tamarindi, but everything that is done here is done well. The essential problem with digital books is that, of course, the ink adheres to the paper by a kind of glorified static electric charge, and it will sooner or later leave the paper behind. In other words, digital printing is impermanent in comparison with letterpress. But for as long as it lasts, this ink is in exactly the right place.

Some, and perhaps all, of the jurors, would steal this book if we were free to steal any one book from all the submissions. The poems are wonderful to read; the typographic prints that accompany them are exciting additions to the text, but the one thing that troubles us is that the text type seems a little weak in comparison with the graphic elements. The poems, although they are very strong, seem to float a bit insecurely on the page.

The letterpress work in this book is absolutely superb: magnificent printing, excellent handsetting. All of us, however, were troubled by the lack of integration between the wood engravings and the text. The engravings are tipped into the book, but they often seemed to us to be tipped in the wrong place and to be in danger of flying off on their own. With one or two exceptions, the engravings are very lively pieces of work, interesting in themselves, yet the book itself, strange to say, might be more satisfying if all those images were omitted. Once a decision is made to include illustrations with the text, it is always necessary to find some way of integrating the two.

In the relatively staid world of letterpress, zany books are always welcome. This is a zany book twice over, because it comes in two editions. The craziness of the text and the irreverence of the typography belong very well together. The presswork is not strong, but the text demands no more.