A Pageant of Birds
New York: Albondocani Press, 1974. Side-stitched volume, measuring 7.5 x 4.75 inches: [32]. Original black and white photographic wrappers over black card. Title page printed in blue and black, six full-page photographs. Lettered and signed in ink at colophon.
Signed limited edition of this Depression-era essay by Eudora Welty, one of 26 lettered copies for private distribution, in addition to 300 copies for sale. In the late 1930s, Welty attended a costume pageant written and directed by Maude Thompson, a leader of the Farish Street Baptist Church in Jackson, Mississippi. Members of the African-American congregation dressed as their favorite birds (“be what you want to”) and paraded around the church, singing and dancing as they circled the rapt spectators: “All came in with an assurance that sprang from complete absorption in their roles – erect in their bright wings and tails and crests, flapping their elbows, dipping their knees, hopping and turning and preening to the music.” After the pageant, Welty offered to photograph the participants in costume, and the images in this book are the result: a portrait of director Maude Thompson, two of the child “Baby Bluebird,” and three of the “Ladies of the Bird Pageant.” Two photographs appear here for the first time in print. A fine copy.
Price: $750.00