To John Hall Wheelock
Hotel Bristol
Rome. November 25, 1936
The first two volumes of the Triton Edition arrived safely two or three days ago. I had already some notion of them, one friend having written that they were beautiful, another that they were discreet, and a third that he was overwhelmed by their external loveliness. I am hardly overwhelmed, but I feel that you have taken infinite pains, have shown exquisite taste, and have produced a monument which if not aere perennius certainly raises me to a higher level as a sort of standard author. All the details please me, with a pleasure that grows on acquaintance; and the pages tempt the eye to read; I have found myself doing so more than in one place where the text in itself was of no particular interest: a circumstance which tends to show that you have expertly combined paper, type, and arrangement of the page to perfection, so that reading becomes a physical pleasure. And this with the art that conceals art, because every feature seems natural and nothing is obtrusive. I noticed this with satisfaction (and relief) at once in respect to the Triton and the title of “Triton Edition”: these are inconspicuous, a bibliographical mark rather than of form of advertisement; and the cameo reproduced is small and charming. It is not, by the way, the particular Triton of the fountain in this square. I write on the hotel paper so that you may see what the Fontana del Tritone really is: but the design you have chosen is prettier and more suitable for a sort of seal for the Works.
From The Letters of George Santayana: Book Five, 1933-1936. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2003.
Location of manuscript: Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Libraries, Princeton NJ.