iwb's review
4.0
There are three things to be said about this book.
First, it's a nice collection of Halloween images before the internet, including photographs, greeting cards, adverts, illustrations from various magazines and books and other ephemera, all of which seem to be between the 1900's-thru maybe the late 1960's.
Second, there is a short--seemingly obligatory-- page and a half essay that is an inaccurate (though not false) history of Halloween--it adds nothing to the point of this book.
Third, aside from the penultimate page, which lists the dates and type of media for the front cover, the back cover, and endpapers, there is no captioned information for any of the images unless such info is in the image itself. (For instance, there is an illustration from a Ladies Home Journal cover in which the date of 1905 is printed on the illustration of the magazine; and a photograph of 6 kids in pig costumes with "1944" inked on the bottom.)
A little of bit information on some of these images throughout would have made this a much more satisfying collection.
First, it's a nice collection of Halloween images before the internet, including photographs, greeting cards, adverts, illustrations from various magazines and books and other ephemera, all of which seem to be between the 1900's-thru maybe the late 1960's.
Second, there is a short--seemingly obligatory-- page and a half essay that is an inaccurate (though not false) history of Halloween--it adds nothing to the point of this book.
Third, aside from the penultimate page, which lists the dates and type of media for the front cover, the back cover, and endpapers, there is no captioned information for any of the images unless such info is in the image itself. (For instance, there is an illustration from a Ladies Home Journal cover in which the date of 1905 is printed on the illustration of the magazine; and a photograph of 6 kids in pig costumes with "1944" inked on the bottom.)
A little of bit information on some of these images throughout would have made this a much more satisfying collection.
kellswitch's review
5.0
A very nice collection of vintage Halloween images and the physical quality of the book is very high as well, which is typical of an ICONS book. I also like how not all the images are from just the greeting cards but other sources such as costumes and wall decorations. There was a very nice variety of images chosen.
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