The theme of this year's National Library Week is "Find Your Joy."

I find my joy browsing the library stacks. This month, I looked for books with fore-edge printing and fore-edge painting. These are methods of applying images to the edges of book pages. Sometimes the image is visible when the book is closed, and sometimes the image is only visible when the pages are fanned. Fore-edge is the edge of a book opposite the spine or the bound edge. I found fore-edge printing on a few art books and science fiction books in the I.D. Weeks Library, but I have not seen fore-edge painting in either Weeks Library or the Archives and Special Collections. Let me know if you do find these treasures. Is there such a thing as fore-edge marbling? The marbled books below are from the Chilson Collection in the Archives and Special Collections. The book with blue top-edge is South Dakota, sui generis; stressing the unique and dramatic in South Dakota history, volume 3, by Doane Robinson. The American Historical Society, Inc., 1930. The book with the green top-edge is History of Dakota Territory / its history and its people, volume 5, by George W. Kingsbury. S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, 1915. A few sources on the history of fore-edge painting are: Weber, Carl J. Fore-Edge Painting; a Historical Survey of a Curious Art in Book Decoration. Irvington-on-Hudson, N.Y: Harvey House, 1966. This book is in the I.D. Weeks Library with call number ND2370 .W37. Brandeis University (February 1, 2016). "Fore-edge Paintings". Robert D. Farber University Archives and Special Collections. Miyatsu, Rose (December 14, 2018). "Fore-Edge Paintings". WashU Libraries.