The Ariel Poems – a sequence of beautifully illustrated poetry pamphlets, published by Faber from 1927 for the Christmas gift market – deserve to be better known.

Thirty-eight had appeared by 1931 when the series ended, and it is clear they significantly contributed to the firm’s reputation for poetry and fine publishing.

They were the brain-child of Richard de la Mare, Faber’s first production director, who personally chose all the poets and the artists. The son of the poet and writer, Walter de la Mare, Richard never failed to make this connection clear in his letters to poets; and the tactic clearly worked. He always also mentioned that both his father and T.S. Eliot had agreed to provide newly written poems for the sequence (and both did so, memorably, every year from 1927-1931).

It is clear from Richard de la Mare’s correspondence, however, that his real concern was to ensure that the artwork was beautiful. To that end he sagely commissioned covers and artwork not only from established artistic figures like Eric Gill, McKnight Kauffer and Graham Sutherland, but also from a range of younger ‘jobbing ‘artists like John and Paul Nash, Barnett Freedman, Edward Bawden, Eric Ravilious, and David Jones. Many of these younger artists were later commissioned to design book covers for Faber books.

Finely printed by the Curwen Press (price 1s), the Ariel poems were a great publishing success. As Edmund Blunden rightly predicted: bookstall-haunters are still delighted to chance upon them!