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Oblong 4to. (25 cm.) [4]1-38[2]p. Illustrated with 10 full-page black and white drawings plus numerous other smaller black and white drawings scattered throughout. Title page decorated with four black and white drawings, including of the three cats. Heavy cardstock covers printed in black and with a color vignette in black, blue and yellow on both covers that duplicates the title page with a cartouche in the center, which has a small boy in a blue coat standing on a gravel path with foliage all around him, and with the three cats displayed around the cartouche gazing on the boy, the whole bound with a wire spiral. Decorative endpapers similar to the drawings in the book, in this case rows of alternating images of the boy and the three cats. Just minor dings around the edges of the covers, covers ever so slightly soiled, corners square and flat, all illustrations in fine condition, spiral intact and without rust, no loss to covers around the spiral, else near fine to fine with no internal markings. Robert Joyce is listed as illustrator of several books in OCLC including The Frightened Tree, and Other Stories (1925), Three White Cats of Avignon (1928), The Magic Flight: Jewish Tales and Legends (1929), The Magic Shoes (1938), and Rubi, the Jungle Boy/and, The Lion Had a Toothache (1938). I have not been able to find any biographical information on him. He is NOT the contemporary children?s book illustrator of The Leaping Leprechaun. OCLC shows only two holding libraries. The story begins as follows: "Three little cats William and Eugene and Pansy Face were on their way home from school with their report cards. It was past midnight and the moonlight made three shadows as they walked along. They saw their Uncle Thomas waiting for a trolley-car. When they showed him their report cards he gave them a penny each and patted Pansy Face on the hear." As they continue they encounter a lone child who is obviously lost and the story goes on from there with the three cats eventually petitioning their Grandpa to be able to keep the little stray boy! In the New York Times, Sunday, July 29, 1934, in the section "New Books for Boys and Girls," the writer has this to say about this book: "an odd little tale with the positions reversed (three cats returning home from school come upon a stray little boy) and with drawings that have "a certain grotesque humor." Robert Joyce is listed as illustrator of several books in OCLC including The Frightened Tree, and Other Stories (1925), Three White Cats of Avignon (1928), The Magic Flight: Jewish Tales and Legends (1929), The Magic Shoes (1938), and Rubi, the Jungle Boy/and, The Lion Had a Toothache (1938). I was unable to find any biographical information on Joyce. He is NOT the contemporary children?s book illustrator of The Leaping Leprechaun. This is a very unusual and charming children's book and a very rare fine!. Seller Inventory # 009533
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