A Colossus of Roads by Patricia Storrar, Günther Komnick

A Colossus of Roads by Patricia Storrar, with design and photography by Günther Komnick, tells the story of Thomas Bain, the great Victorian road engineer of the Cape Colony. It was published in 1984 by Murray & Roberts/Concor, set in Cape Town by Diatype Setting and printed and bound by Hansa Reproprint, Cape Town. This copy is bound in brown cloth with gilt-stamped detail on the front board and spine, and comes in its original dust jacket.

A Colossus of Roads follows Bain’s life and work as he surveyed and built many of the mountain passes and roads that opened up the Cape interior in the nineteenth century.

Thomas Bain’s passes, among them the famous Swartberg Pass, remain some of the most remarkable feats of engineering in South Africa and are still driven and admired today. A Colossus of Roads is a fitting tribute to a man whose roads shaped travel, farming and trade in the Western and Eastern Cape.

Condition – Very Good

This 1984 hardcover is in very good condition, in a good dust jacket. The brown cloth boards have gilt-stamped detail on the front board and spine, slightly faded but still clearly visible. The dust jacket shows moderate wear, especially around the edges, with minor loss on the rear panel and on the spine. There are tape marks on the endpapers, suggesting the book was plastic covered at one stage, and the endpaper verso carries an ink stamp with ink writing. Slight foxing is present. The binding is sound.