Search Results: 19th Century American Literature from Charles Agvent

New York: The Century Company, January 1893. First Edition. Wraps. Spine with short tears at tips; small chip at outer edge of front wrap. Near Fine. Original printed wraps. The first appearance of Twain's story. Also includes articles on John Greenleaf Whittier (with a portrait); Halbot Knight Browne "Phiz," with illustrations by him; the Great Wall of China; and the Kindergarten Movement. Illustrated with engravings.

New York: Charles L. Webster & Company, 1885. First Edition. Hardcover. Hinges fine; some rubbing to gilt on the spine and a little to the cloth, mostly to the rear cover. Contents lightly foxed. Light wear to spine tips and corners. Very Good or better. Original decorated green cloth. With 174 illustrations by E. W. Kemble. BAL 3415: With first issue points of pages 13, 57, and 143; second issue of title page, frontispiece, and page 155; and fourth issue of page 283. Also with McBride's first issue point on page 143. Recent Twain scholarship convincingly establishes three changes from the printing plates of the first printing of 30,000 copies and later printings: 1) an erroneous page reference "88" on page 13 later changed to "87" (BAL's point 2); 2) the misprint "with the was" on page 57 later corrected to "with the saw" (BAL's point 3); and 3) the misprint "Decided" on page 9 later changed to "Decides" (not noted by BAL). This copy has all three first printing points. Nineteenth century pink… Read More

Hartford, CT: The American Publishing Company, 1876. First American Edition. Hardcover. Two pages with professional repairs to tears; hinges unbroken and covers tight. Light edgewear with some rubbing and wear to the spine. Easily Very Good. FIRST PRINTING on wove paper and with half-title and frontispiece with blank versos and with "THE" on the half-title page in 10-point rather than 14-point type. Original blue cloth with peach endpapers with front and rear triple flyleaves of laid paper; four pages of ads at the rear. BAL 3369. MacDonnell, 39-40. Illustrated by True Williams and others.

Cleveland: World Syndicate, n.d. Reprint. Hardcover. Fine in a bright and colorful Very Good dustwrapper with moderate edgewear. Dustwrapper art by Irwin Weltman, dated 1933.

Cambridge: Limited Editions Club, 1939. Hardcover. Just a touch of sunning to the spine. About Fine, lacking the slipcase. Thomas Hart Benton. Octavo (6-1/4" x 9-1/2") bound in full blue denim with a paper spine label. Edited with an introduction by Bernard DeVoto. Designed by C. P. Rollins. Illustrated with 70 drawings by Thomas Hart Benton. Copy #1257 of 1500 copies SIGNED by the artist on the colophon page.

London: Chatto & Windus, 1884. First British Edition. Hardcover. Typical sunning to spine with mild fraying to head and neat cloth repair to heel. Minor spotting to covers. Near Fine. Decorated red cloth. Preceding the American edition by four months. With 174 illustrations by E.W. Kemble. BAL 3414: Sequence B with the gatherings saddle-stitched with wire staples as opposed to sewn. BAL assigns no priority to the sequences. With the publisher's catalogue insert at rear dated October 1884, per BAL.

Cambridge: Limited Editions Club, 1939. Hardcover. Sporadic foxing, mostly light, a few pages with marginal stains. Spine lightly sunned, as often the case with some wrinkling to the label. Very Good, lacking the slipcase. Thomas Hart Benton. Octavo (6-1/4" x 9-1/2") bound in full blue denim with a paper spine label. Edited with an introduction by Bernard DeVoto. Designed by C. P. Rollins. Illustrated with 70 drawings by Thomas Hart Benton. Copy #323 of 1500 copies SIGNED by the artist on the colophon page.

Cambridge: Limited Editions Club, 1939. Hardcover. Spine lightly sunned, as often the case. Near Fine in a Good slipcase missing the bottom edge. Thomas Hart Benton. Octavo (6-1/4" x 9-1/2") bound in full blue denim with a paper spine label. Edited with an introduction by Bernard DeVoto. Designed by C. P. Rollins. Illustrated with 70 drawings by Thomas Hart Benton. Copy #440 of 1500 copies SIGNED by the artist on the colophon page.

New York: Charles L. Webster & Company, 1885. First Edition. Hardcover. Hinges tight. Internally a very clean copy and very unusual as such. Light wear to corners, faint tape stains to boards. Near Fine. First Printing. Publisher's library binding of full sheep, the scarcest of the bindings for this title, here very skillfully rebacked retaining the original leather spine labels. With 174 illustrations by E. W. Kemble. BAL 3415. Earliest issue for four points of BAL's seven points and with McBride's point. Recent Twain scholarship convincingly establishes three changes from the printing plates of the first printing of 30,000 copies and later printings: 1) an erroneous page reference "88" on page 13 later changed to "87" (BAL's point 2); 2) the misprint "with the was" on page 57 later corrected to "with the saw" (BAL's point 3); and 3) the misprint "Decided" on page 9 later changed to "Decides" (not noted by BAL). This copy has all three first printing points as well as most of the earliest points… Read More

Cambridge: Limited Editions Club, 1939. Hardcover. Browning to two facing pages from a clipping that was once laid in. Spine lightly sunned, as often the case with some soiling to the label. Still Near Fine, lacking the slipcase. Thomas Hart Benton. Octavo (6-1/4" x 9-1/2") bound in full blue denim with a paper spine label. Edited with an introduction by Bernard DeVoto. Designed by C. P. Rollins. Illustrated with 70 drawings by Thomas Hart Benton. Copy #665 of 1500 copies SIGNED by the artist on the colophon page.

London: George Routledge and Sons, 1873. First British Edition. Hardcover. Owner name of E. M. Vincent on the half-title page. Some bubbling to the cloth, light rubbing and wear to the spine tips. Very Good and a fine Association Copy. According to BAL 12164, "Apparently published simultaneously in Boston and London." Small octavo (4" x 6-1/2") bound in publisher's gilt-ruled and lettered green cloth with black stamping. State 1. A Presentation Copy from Longfellow INSCRIBED in the poet's distinct hand on the verso of the front endpaper: "Mrs. Theodore Parker/with kind regards/of the Author/June 11, 1874." Mrs. Theodore Parker (Lydia Cabot) was the wife of Theodore Parker (1810-1860) who was a leading abolitionist, American Transcendentalist, and, along with William Ellery Channing, the most important and influential Unitarian minister of the nineteenth century. Parker's sermons inspired speeches by Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King, Jr. Parker wrote in 1850: "A democracy -- that is a… Read More

New Haven, CT: Published by the author, 1841. First Octavo Edition. Hardcover. Light, scattered foxing; stain at bottom margin of first volume not affecting text. Covers rubbed with some loss of leather and staining to first volume; binding tight and firm. Very Good. Two royal octavo (7" x 10-1/2") volumes in contemporary calf leather with gilt-lettered black morocco spine labels, marbled edges and endpapers. Illustrated with a frontispiece portrait. Webster's groundbreaking dictionary was originally published in New York in 1828 in a slightly larger format. Laid in is the Preface to the Revised Edition of 1847. PRINTING AND THE MIND OF MAN 291: "Webster was an ardent nationalist and he wanted to stress the political separation from Britain by the cultivation of a separate American language. Under the influence of his friend Benjamin Franklin he turned his attention to 'a reformed mode of spelling,' and although he rejected the radical phonetic innovations proposed by Franklin, he went far enough to… Read More

San Marino, CA: The Huntington Library, 1969. Second Revised Edition. Hardcover. Fine in a Near Fine dustwrapper.

San Marino, CA: The Huntington Library, 1965. First Edition. Hardcover. Fine in a Near Fine dustwrapper with uneven sunning. Second Printing with additions and corrections.

Boston: James R. Osgood & Co., 1876. Early Edition. Hardcover. Photograph and signature close to Fine. Light soiling to covers; touch of fraying to spine tips. Near Fine. Publisher's gilt-lettered brick cloth. First published in 1870, this copy has pasted to the first blank an early oval-shaped photograph of the poet on a 2-1/4" x 3-3/4" paper mount that is SIGNED "J. R. Lowell/13th June 1861." Lowell is quite uncommon in signed photographs. Chapters on witchcraft and Shakespeare, among others. Armorial bookplate with the name "Raymond" on the front pastedown.

Riverdale on the Hudson and New York City, 4 January 1902 and 29 July 1904. Letters. The Bandar Log Press envelope is quite fragile with chipping along the edges. The remaining material is Near Fine. Archive of 6 pieces including two AUTOGRAPH LETTERS SIGNED with excellent content, one letter referencing a famous passage of his and the other a poignant unpublished letter pertaining to his wife Olivia who had died the previous month. Both letters by Clemens are on small (3-1/2" x 5" and 3-1/2" x 6") pieces of mourning stationery written to John Francis "Frank" Holme, a newspaper sketch artist who covered the trials of Adolph Luetgert for the CHICAGO DAILY NEWS. Holme was also a writer and printer who founded a publishing endeavor called the Bandar Log Press. Clemens and Holme were friends, and Clemens was among those who contributed financially to the project. The earliest letter from Clemens to Holme is dated 4 January 1902 from Riverdale on the Hudson. Clemens moved his family to Riverdale from… Read More

Northampton, MA, 1902 - 1903. Letters and Manuscripts. Some tears and wrinkles; two letters are laid down on cardboard. Very Good condition overall. Superb collection of material by this former Confederate soldier and important, neglected writer who paved the way for modern Southern writers such as Faulkner and Welty in dealing with the pervasive issue of race. Includes 9 AUTOGRAPH LETTERS SIGNED (ALSs) to Confederate officer Alexander Porter Morse; 1 AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED (ALS) to publisher Charles Scribner; 2 AUTOGRAPH MANUSCRIPTS SIGNED (AMSs) addressed to Morse's children; and 2 TYPED LETTERS, unsigned, from Morse to Cable; along with 5 envelopes addressed in Cable's hand. The letters mostly concern Cable's work and his interest in Morse's experiences in the Civil War. The letter from Cable to Scribner is one of introduction for Morse. Some excerpts: "I have begun another cavalry story of New Orleans and Vicksburg, and I want to sit you down in my library and make you talk. Oh dear! how can I… Read More

Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields, 1850. First Edition. Hardcover. Spine, as is usually the case, partly eroded. Rubbed and edgeworn. Contents partly soiled, foxed. Good+. BAL 8757: State A, Binding A of original glazed boards: 2500 copies.

Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields, 1850. First Edition. Hardcover. Dampstain to slightly more than the lower half of nearly all of the pages but not affecting the inscription. Spine, as is usually the case, partly eroded. Still Very Good. One could not hope for a better association. BAL 8757: First Printing, State B (A?), Binding A of original glazed boards; 39 pages: 2500 copies printed of this poem delivered at the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Yale College on 14 August 1850. INSCRIBED and SIGNED by the author on the front endpaper: "H. W. Longfellow/With the compliments of/O. W. Holmes." An absolutely superb presentation copy linking two giants of nineteenth century American Literature. With the bookplate of the Longfellow Collection of Harvard College Library on the front pastedown, deaccessioned.

Cambridge: Privately Printed: The Riverside Press, 1890. First Edition. Hardcover. A couple of pages with offsetting from previously laid in news clippings. Near Fine in a Fine chemise and close to Fine slipcase with a sunned spine. Publisher's olive cloth. BAL 22137: 277 copies printed. As with many copies this has the slip of paper tipped in at the front with Whittier's facsimile signature and presentation, but in addition this copy is INSCRIBED but not signed by Whittier at the top of the front blank: "To my dear friends/Caroline A. Bulla,/and Mary W. Bulla." Housed in a green cloth chemise lettered in gilt "First Edition/Douglas Young Jr. Collection" and a green morocco-backed cloth slipcase with four raised bands and gilt lettering on the spine.