Amarant: The Flora & Fauna of Atlantis
Young Adult Fantasy Antiquarian & Collectible Mysticism Fantasy Art & Culture Folklore & Mythology Illustrated Books
Amarant: The Flora & Fauna of Atlantis is the 1981 cult-favorite picture book that fantasy-art collectors hunt for years to find. Una Woodruff’s hand-painted plates—every orchid-eyed sea-dragon, opalescent moth and spiraling Atlantean fern—are reproduced at full size on heavy matte stock, giving each page the feel of an original watercolor framed between boards. Paper Tiger’s out-of-print hardcover is famously fragile; this copy still carries its bright dust-jacket and a binding so tight it cracks when you open it, yet shows only light foxing on the front endpapers and one barely-there page crease—condition most dealers list as “near fine” for this title.
Inside, Woodruff masquerades as a Victorian naturalist who “discovered” the lost continent’s surviving ecosystems, pairing field notes written in copperplate script with scientifically labeled paintings that echo Audubon and Rackham. The result is a coffee-table volume that doubles as a grimoire: readers use the botanical codes and lunar charts to “grow” imaginary gardens or to inspire cosplay, tattoo flash, and RPG world-building. Young adults love the hybrid creatures; adults prize the esoteric Easter-eggs—alchemical sigils, star-maps, and runic plant names—that have made the book a staple on “sacred art” and “mystic folklore” reading lists.
Because Paper Tiger pulped unsold stock decades ago, intact first printings with jackets now trade in the high three figures. This unrestored, un-inscribed copy offers collectors the rare chance to own the complete visual narrative without restoration marks or book-plate scars—perfect for display beside Brian Froud or Eyvind Earle volumes. Whether you shelve it among antiquarian curios, gift it to a fantasy-loving teen, or mine it for artistic reference, Amarant remains the definitive illustrated field guide to a world that never was, yet feels hauntingly alive on every gilt-edged page.
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