[ Printed booklet. ] The Idea of a British Book Trade Association. An Address given to The Society of Bookmen by Basil Blackwell.

12pp., 8vo. Stapled into light-brown printed wraps, with title in dark-brown on white label on front wrap. In good condition, lightly aged and worn. Blackwell's address is on pp.3-10; p.11 carries a 'List of Members 30th June 1937', in two columns, including R. Cobden-Sanderson, Geoffrey Faber, Rupert Hart-Davis, Harold Macmillan, Stanley Unwin and Sir Hugh Walpole. The final page carries details of the Society's officers, committee, secretary and offices. Blackwell begins his address: 'I have nothing new or strange to propose to-night. Not seldom, when the shadows have lengthened, what time men's hearts go out to each other, and some group of Publishers and Booksellers has been discussing Trade affairs, not seldom have we heard one say, "Of course, there ought to be one Trade Association"; and forthwith the company is magicked into architects of "cloud-clapped towers" and "solemn temples" until some interruption (as it might be "Time, gentlemen, please!") breaks the spell; and as the company disperses, so dissolves the baseless fabric of their vision.' Uncommon: the only copies on COPAC at Oxford, the LSE, and Reading.