The publisher's original fair copy [издательский макет] of Chorny's Children's Island [Detsky Ostrov] contains 117 pages with handwritten by the poet autographs of his 78 poems (a number of them are on 2 pages each) and 36 Grigoriev's original ink and wash drawings for the illustrations.
[ the book using it was actually published: Berlin: Slovo, [1921]
172 pages (size varies, sheets approximately 11 x 8 1/2 in.; 279 x 216 mm), comprising autographs of 78 Chorny's poems in black and blue ink, 117 pages with a few manuscript corrections, and 22 full-page and 14 other (half-page and smaller) original drawings (ink and wash) by Grigoriev; minor wear and fraying at the right edges of a few leaves; on Fabriano Artistico Extra White Watercolor Paper with watermarks "Extra Forte C. M. Fabriano". Bound up in half cloth, patterned boards, with the hand-colored lithographed cover illustration of the first edition affixed to the front cover; worn at edges, lithograph with some dampstaining and browning.Provenance: Sotheby's sale Fine Books & Manuscripts lot 201 14 Jun 2016 | New York ["настоящая сокровищница легких, лаконичных зарисовок, в которых чистота и грация линии сливается с зоркой точностью натурной характеристики зверей и птиц, пейзажей и детишек. Добрый и ясный мир детства колдовской тишиной дышит на рисунках] http://raruss.ru/best-soviet-childrens-books/2612-childrens-island.html Authenticity of the object is confirmed by Dr. Tamara Galeeva - author of the monograph on Boris Grigoriev creations : GRIGORIEV Boris. Text by Tamara Galeeva, Galart 1995 PRICE BY REQUEST
Originally as you can see on our illustrations Sasha Chernyi wrote autographs of all poems using so called new orthography - introduced on territory of former Russian Empire in May 1917 (in particular instead of letters "Ѣ" and "І" he uses everywhere "Е" and "И") - thus it evidently was planned to publish the book in Russia (and that means probably before poet emigrated to Europe in 1918) but when the project came to a publication in German emigration publishing house an unknown corrector had changed all texts returning it to Russian pre-Revolutionary orthography. That point was considered to be important for Russian emigration society (данное отношение афористично выразил И. А. Бунин: «По приказу самого Архангела Михаила никогда не приму большевистского правописания. Уж хотя бы по одному тому, что никогда человеческая рука не писала ничего подобного тому, что пишется теперь по этому правописанию»). Preparing a drawing for a title page of the book (and its cover lithograph) Boris Grigoriev already had in mind that consideration and used pre-Revolutionary orthography in capital letters of the title "ДЪТСКIЙ ОСТРОВЪ"- even specifically exploiting a character of every letter, providing them with some additional features and mimicking a possible childish handwriting. A preparatory drawing for the book in pencil (shown as the last picture on that page) was sold at Sotheby's: Sketch of a Dog (1920) Drawing-Watercolor , Pencil/paper , 22.7 cm x 17.5 cm Estimate: 9,692 - $13,568 Hammer price: $9,692 Sotheby's, London United Kingdom, 28 Nov 2006; similar drawing was sold for $11000 Christies 28.11.2016
