(iv),
20pp. A remarkable calligraphic ode to the first iteration of the Olympic Games
to take place after the Second World War. After the title page, almost entirely
rendered in gilt, the manuscript begins, appropriately, with the Olympic rings
against a background of doves. A subsequent epigraph conveys the spirit of the
Games in the postwar era: "The most important thing in the Olympic Games
is not winning, but taking part. The essential in Life is not conquering but
fighting well." Then Sweet records the winning competitors in their
respective sports, with names and specific events in black, national
affiliations in red, and details in gray. The sporting categories are themselves
written in blue and with a gilt initial, and the "A" in Athletics
receives special treatment, with a background of cross-hatched blue and linear
details extending the length of the page. Notable athletes of 1948 were Dutch
sprinter Fanny Blankers-Koen, the seventeen-year-old American decathlete Bob
Mathias, and Finnish gymnast Veikko Huhtanen. The conclusion supplies the final
gold medal count and nods to the past, present, and future of the Games with a
clever combination of the flags of Greece, England, and Finland (Helsinki would
host the 1952 Olympics). Bound in full brown morocco with a cover design showing
an angular riff on the five Olympic rings, rendered both in gilt and in blind.
Spine in six compartments with gilt titling. Mild rubs to corners, else near
fine in original dropback box.