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In 1967, James K Baxter returned for a second year as Burns Fellow at the University of Otago. While he was here, Dr Maslen printed an edition of 240 copies of Baxter’s The Lion Skin, priced to sell at 75 cents each. While type-setting the book, Maslen had propped up in front of him a copy of Joseph Moxon’s Mechanick Exercises on the Whole Art of Printing, published serially 1683-84. This publication, one of the earliest European manuals of printing, enabled Maslen to compare 20th-century Bibliography Room practices with those best practices in Moxon’s day. Here is Baxter’s typescript poem of ‘The Lion Skin’ and an early proof copy.
Proof copy of James K. Baxter’s The Lion Skin, 1967