Oxford World's Classics vs. Penguin Classics

Both the traditional King James Version and the New Cambridge Paragraph Bible are available in handsome text-only, black-letter, paperback editions which include the Apocrypha.  The Oxford World's Classics KJV and the Penguin Classics NCPB are both bricks - at least two inches thick - with sturdy, opaque paper.  Both editions print the entire Bible without editorial interruptions - all the extensive notes are found at the back of the book.  This feature also provides some ballast for the New Testament: even when you are reading Revelation, there are still about a hundred more pages in the book!

Here is a comparison of these two Bibles:

Biblical text 
Oxford: Standard 1769; words that have no equivalent in the original text are printed in italics.
Penguin: 1611, but with modern spelling and punctuation; no words are in italics.

In both editions
Epistle Dedicatory.

Also included 
Oxford: The Translators to the Reader, a 36-page Introduction by Robert Carroll and Stephen Prickett, 121 pages of Notes on the books of the Bible, a four-page Glossary to the Notes and six maps printed over eleven pages.

Penguin: A 16-page Introduction by David Norton, 53 pages of Notes on the books of the Bible, five maps printed over seven pages - and 14 sheets of blank paper at the back!

Presentation
The Oxford is double-column; the Penguin is single-column.
The Oxford is verse-by-verse; the Penguin is paragraphed.

Font size
Slightly larger in the Penguin than in the Oxford.

Page size 
Oxford: 5 x 7 11/16 x 2 1/8 inches.
Penguin: 5 1/4 x 8 7/16 x 2 inches.

Printed text
Oxford: 4 1/8 x 6 inches.
Penguin: 3 7/8 x 7 3/8 inches.

Lines per page
Oxford: 47 (7.83 lines per vertical inch).
Penguin: 48 (6.51 lines per vertical inch).
There is more space between the lines in the Penguin than in the Oxford.

Books begin...
Oxford: where the previous one ended.
Penguin: at the top of a page (with one exception) and usually on a right-hand page (with two exceptions).

Text sample (click on “Search inside this book”)
Oxford
Penguin

Paper opacity
Excellent in both.  It is a paradox that these cheapest of Bibles have the most opaque paper!

From the Introduction
Oxford: “The Bible is the basic book of our civilization.  It holds a unique and exclusive status not merely in terms of the religious history of the western world but also in literary history and even in what might be called our collective cultural psyche.”

Penguin: “Experienced throughout life by generations of English-speakers, [the KJV] is at the heart of English-speaking religion and culture, shaping emotional history, law, language and literature.  Whether or not one is a Christian, one cannot know what it means to be part of an English-speaking heritage without knowledge of the King James Bible.”

Everyman's Library vs. NCPB

Hardback Bibles are one of the best-kept secrets in the world of quality Bibles.  Most Bible aficionados are preoccupied with leather bindings - and one can see why: holding a fine leather Bible can be a sublime experience.  But a hardback edition provides the same text block for a fraction of the cost - in the case of the New Cambridge Paragraph Bible, the hardback edition with the Apocrypha is a third of the price of the leather edition; the hardback without the Apocrypha is just 29% of the cost of the same edition in leather.

Hardback editions are also much more convenient.  Unless your leather Bible came with a rigid slipcase, it must be stored horizontally.  If you own even a few leather Bibles you know how hard it is to easily grab just the one you want from the stack!  A high-quality hardback Bible, standing vertically on a book shelf, can be used easily - and therefore more often.

Below is a brief comparison of two hardback, personal-size, single-column, black-letter King James Bibles: a brace of volumes published by Everyman’s Library and the 2011 Revised edition of the NCPB.

Publishing a Bible in two volumes should allow real gains to be made in the two great drawbacks of most Bibles: thin paper and small type.  Unfortunately, the Everyman’s Library volumes of the Old and New Testament are only partially successful in overcoming these: the paper is more opaque than in the NCPB, but the print is smaller.

Finally, if you like to keep the dustjackets on your Bibles, you might consider getting the British editions of the Everyman’s Library instead of the American ones - I think the design is more stately.  Otherwise, the books themselves are the same, finished in a gorgeous and distinguished light taupe cloth cover.  The NCPB is cased in a hard, smooth marble-looking cover. 

Biblical text 
Everyman’s: Standard 1769; words that have no equivalent in the original text are printed in italics.
NCPB: 1611, but with modern spelling and punctuation; no words are in italics.

Apocrypha included? 
Everyman’s: No.
NCPB: Available with or without the Apocrypha.

Also on each page 
Everyman’s: Nothing else.
NCPB: Marginal notes in the inside margin.

In both editions
Epistle Dedicatory.
The Translators to the Reader.

Also included 
Everyman’s: In the Old Testament volume, a 37-page introduction by George Steiner; in the New Testament, a 44-page introduction by John Drury - and in both, a cloth ribbon! 
NCPB: A five-page Editor’s Introduction by David Norton.

Format
Everyman’s: Each verse begins on a new line.
NCPB: Printed in paragraphs.

Font
Everyman’s: Ehrhardt.
NCPB: Swift.

Font size
Slightly larger in the NCPB than in the Everyman’s.

Page size
Everyman’s: 5 x 7 1/16 inches.
NCPB: 5 3/4 x 8 1/4 inches.

Printed text (not including marginal notes)
Everyman’s: 3 1/2 x 6 1/16 inches.
NCPB: 3 3/4 x 7 1/8 inches.

Lines per page
Everyman’s: 42.
NCPB: 48.
There is slightly more space between the lines of the NCPB than in the Everyman’s.

Books begin...
Everyman’s: at the top of a page.
NCPB: at the top of a page (with one exception) and usually on a right-hand page.

Page size 
Everyman’s: 4 7/8 x 8 inches.
NCPB: 5 1/4 x 8 1/2 inches.

Printed text (not including marginal notes)
Everyman’s: 3 3/4 x 6 1/8 inches.
NCPB: 3 7/8 x 7 3/4 inches.

Paper opacity
In the Everyman’s volumes, the paper in the New Testament is slightly more opaque than in the Old Testament, but both are noticeably better than the NCPB.  (However, none of these three volumes is as opaque as the Penguin Classics edition of the NCPB).

Thomas Nelson vs. Penguin Classics

The layout of the New Cambridge Paragraph Bible makes it a joy to read.  Some people, however - though loving the design - may prefer the standard KJV text to David Norton’s restoration.  So, in a previous post, I compared two personal-size, single-column, paragraph-format, black-letter King James Bibles published in 2011 by Cambridge University Press: the Clarion Reference Bible and the Revised edition of the NCPB.

Here is a comparison of two text-only, single-column, paragraph-format, black-letter King James Bibles: one published by Thomas Nelson and the other by Penguin Classics:

Biblical text 
Thomas Nelson: Standard 1769; words that have no equivalent in the original text are printed in italics.

Penguin Classics: 1611, but with modern spelling and punctuation; no words are in italics.

Apocrypha included? 
Thomas Nelson: No.
Penguin Classics: Yes.

Also on each page 
Thomas Nelson: Marginal notes at the bottom of the page.
Penguin Classics: Nothing else.

In both editions
Epistle Dedicatory.

Also included 
Thomas Nelson: Bible in a Year reading plan, 30 days with Jesus, 90 day overview of the Bible, Passages for Christmas and Easter, and a concordance.

Penguin Classics: A 16-page Introduction, 53 pages of Notes on the books of the Bible, and seven pages of maps.

Font size
Slightly larger in the Thomas Nelson than in the Penguin Classics (which is slightly larger than the font used in the 2011 Revised edition).

Page size 
Thomas Nelson: 5 1/2 x 8 5/16 inches.
Penguin Classics: 5 1/4 x 8 1/2 inches.

Printed text (not including marginal notes)
Thomas Nelson: 4 3/16 x 7 3/16 inches.
Penguin Classics: 3 7/8 x 7 3/8 inches.

Lines per page
Thomas Nelson: 47 (6.54 lines per vertical inch).
Penguin Classics: 48 (6.51 lines per vertical inch).
There is slightly more space between the lines in the Penguin Classics than in the Thomas Nelson.

Books begin...
Thomas Nelson: at the top of a page.
Penguin Classics: at the top of a page (with one exception) and usually on a right-hand page (with two exceptions).

Text sample
Thomas Nelson
Penguin Classics (but ignore the marginal notes, which are in all other editions of the NCPB).

Paper opacity
Noticeably better in the Penguin Classics than in the Thomas Nelson.  (The paper opacity in the 2011 Revised edition is somewhere in between these two editions.)

Bindings available
Thomas Nelson: Black leather or leather-like.
Penguin Classics: Paperback.

Paper

To me, the most important feature of a Bible is the paper.  And the most important specification of the paper is its opacity.  Because of their length, Bibles are printed on thin paper.  How well the paper shields the reader from what is printed on the other side, not to mention the next page, is crucial.

Every edition of the New Cambridge Paragraph Bible is printed on different paper stock.  Let me review them, from best to worst.  Though I haven’t seen it, I will assume that the two-volume Folio Society edition, which is printed on Abbey Wove paper, is the best.  At $975, it should be!

The single-volume Folio Society edition must be next.  The publisher says it has thicker paper than most other Folio Society books - which is great, but it costs $150.

Among the affordable editions of the NCPB, the cheapest one has the next best paper.  The Penguin Classics edition, a two-inch thick paperback book, uses a sturdy paper that keeps glimpses of upcoming pages to a minimum.

Slightly less opaque is the paper used in the First Cambridge edition, now sadly out of print.  The decent paper stock and the printer’s careful line-matching ensure that you really only notice the text that is printed on the reverse side of the page when reading the poetry sections.

Last, and I’m afraid least, is the Revised Cambridge edition.  This is especially unfortunate because it is the only affordable edition of the NCPB published in hardback or leather bindings.  And it’s the only edition available either with or without the Apocrypha.

I suppose only the paper in a lectern Bible is truly opaque (even the picture of Judith 16 in the two-volume Folio Society edition reveals some show-through) but the closer one can get to that ideal in a personal-size Bible, the better.

On the right

I like it when each book of the Bible begins on a new page.  As wonderful as my Cambridge KJV Large-print text edition is, only 20 of its 66 books start at the top of a page.  Joshua, 1 Samuel, Acts and Romans begin at the bottom of the page - it just doesn’t look right.

This is something the New Cambridge Paragraph Bible almost gets right.  Not only do most books begin on a new page - they start at the top of a right-hand page!  Very classy.  In the Cambridge First edition and the Penguin Classics edition, 25 of the 80 books end on a right-hand page, requiring the next (left-hand) page to remain blank so the next book can begin on the right - a lovely indulgence.

It is only near the end of the New Testament that this wonderful practice begins to slip: 2 Peter and 3 John start on left-hand pages - and, what's worse, 2 John begins in the middle of a page.  What a shame.

In addition to these three books, the Cambridge Revised edition also demotes five more books to a left-hand page start: Bel and the Dragon, The Prayer of Manasses, 2 Timothy, Titus and Philemon.  One assumes the publishers did this to save four pages, but then why did they insert two blank sheets of paper at the end of the Old Testament?  This wasn’t done in earlier editions and it offsets exactly the savings these changes were presumably meant to make!  How much better the Revised edition would have been if Cambridge had added just three more sheets of paper to the New Testament and started all 80 books on the right.

Missing words

Of all the typographical errors in the first two editions of the New Cambridge Paragraph Bible, only one is substantial.  Leviticus 11:35 is the only place where words of the KJV are missing from the printed text.

The first two lines of this verse are identical in every edition.  After that, however, things begin to go wrong in the Cambridge First edition (2005) and the Penguin Classics edition (2006).  The 2005 edition omits the rest of the text.  The 2006 edition begins to correct this mistake, but (surprisingly) only adds the last three words of the verse - still omitting nine other words.  The entire verse is not published in the NCPB until 2011.

Here is how these three editions print Leviticus 11:35:

2005 Cambridge First edition 
35 And everything whereupon any part of their carcase falleth
shall be unclean; whether it be oven, or ranges for pots, they shall be

2006 Penguin Classics edition 
35 And everything whereupon any part of their carcase falleth
shall be unclean; whether it be oven, or ranges for pots, they shall be
unclean unto you.

2011 Cambridge Revised edition 
35 And everything whereupon any part of their carcase falleth
shall be unclean; whether it be oven, or ranges for pots, they shall be
broken down: for they are unclean, and shall be unclean unto you.

Corrections to the 2006 text

In a Note to the Revised Edition (2011), David Norton writes: “Errors of the press and of editorial judgement are corrected in this edition of The New Cambridge Paragraph Bible.  Most of the corrections have already appeared in the Penguin and Folio Society editions...” 

Indeed, the 2011 edition only made 31 corrections to the Penguin Classics edition, which was published in 2006.  Here is a list of those changes. 

The first line is the location in the text, the second is the 2006 Penguin edition, and the third line is the corrected text, as printed in the 2011 Cambridge edition.

In two passages, Leviticus 11:35 and 2 Samuel 1:10, the Penguin edition changed the text of the First Cambridge edition (2005), but these passages still needed to be corrected in the 2011 edition.

Passage
2006 Penguin text
2011 Cambridge text

* * * * *

Genesis 22: 16-18
and said, ‘By myself have I sworn,’ saith the Lord, ‘for because… obeyed my voice.’

and said, ‘ “By myself have I sworn,” saith the Lord, “for because… obeyed my voice.” ’

Genesis 40:6
and, behold
and behold

Leviticus 11:35
ranges for pots, they shall be unclean unto you. 36

ranges for pots, they shall be broken down: for they are unclean, and shall be unclean unto you. 36

Joshua 2:10
when ye came 

when you came 


what ye did
what you did

Joshua 24:11
And you went
And ye went

2 Samuel 1:10 
lord.”
lord.’

2 Samuel 21:17
swore unto him, saying, Thou shalt… light of Israel.
swore unto him, saying, ‘Thou shalt… light of Israel’.

1 Kings 14:12
thine own
thy own

1 Chronicles 21:2
knowit
know it

Psalm 50:5
Gather
‘Gather

sacrifice.
sacrifice.’

Psalm 50:7
Hear
‘Hear

Psalm 50:15
glorify me.
glorify me.’

Psalm 55:17
Evening, and
Evening and

noon, will
noon will

Psalm 99:4
king’s
King’

Psalm 107:3
east,
east

north,
north

Psalm 113:6
earth!
earth?

Psalm 139:11
cover me:
cover me’:

about me’.
about me.

Psalm 144:2
My
my

Psalm 148:12
young men,
young men

old men,
old men

Jeremiah 2:13
For
‘For

Jeremiah 4:9
wonder’.
wonder.’

The rest of Esther 11:6
And
and

1 Maccabees 2:29
wilderness,
wilderness

1 Maccabees 8:4
And
and

Mark 9:21
child’.
child.

Mark 9:22
us.
us.’

Four editions

The New Cambridge Paragraph Bible has been published in four editions, the first three of which include the Apocrypha:

1) Cambridge University Press (2005)
in hardback (978-0-521-84386-7)
and black French Morocco leather (978-0-521-84387-4).
Size: 7 1/4 x 10 x 2 inches.

2) Penguin Classics (2006) The Bible
in paperback (978-0-141-44151-1).
Size: 5 1/4 x 8 1/2 x 2 inches.

3) Folio Society (2011)
in single-volume
and two-volume fine hardback.
Size: 7 1/4 x 11 inches.

4) Cambridge University Press (2011) Revised Edition
in hardback with the Apocrypha (978-0-521-76284-7)
or without the Apocrypha (978-0-521-19501-0)
and black calfskin leather with the Apocrypha (978-0-521-19881-3)
or without the Apocrypha (978-0-521-19063-3).
Size: 6 x 8 1/2 x 1 3/4 (with the Apocrypha).