"The Count of Monte Cristo," Alexandre Dumas, c.1920s

Antique, color-illustrated The Count of Monte Cristo. Dodd, Mead & Company, New York (c.1928). Illustrated by Mead Schaeffer. 472 pages. Black cover with tipped-in cover art and gilt lettering and decoration. Green monochrome pictorial pastedowns depicting Château d'If, red top edge, deckled foredge. Seven color illustration plates. Dumas (1902-1870), was a French novelist (also authored The Three Musketeers and The Man in the Iron Mask) and dramatist of mixed-race ancestry. The Count of Monte Cristo, a swashbuckling adventure, romance, revenge novel, alludes to Dumas' father, Thomas Dumas. Thomas was the son of a French nobleman and an enslaved African. He served as General for, and ultimately was betrayed by, Napolean. The cover motif--in black, crimson, and gold--and Mead Schaeffer's depiction of Edmond Dantes is chillingly apropos. And further enhanced by the red top edge and desolate-looking envy-green monochrome pastedowns. Schaeffer was a prolific and respected illustrator,