Alice's Adventures in Wonderland; [together with:] Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There. by CARROLL, Lewis - 1866 & 1872

London: Macmillan and Co.,, 1866 & 1872. Original cloth 2 works, octavo. Original red cloth, spines lettered in gilt, triple gilt fillets to covers with gilt vignette centrepieces, blue endpapers, gilt edges. Housed in a red quarter morocco solander box by the Chelsea Bindery. Frontispieces and 90 illustrations by John Tenniel. Adventures in Wonderland generally dulled, stained, worn, and rubbed, rear hinge split with short closed tear to rear endpaper (binder's ticket to rear pastedown), contents with some occasional light finger-soiling, short closed tear at foot of pp. 99/100 and at head of pp. 119/120 with a few minor nicks elsewhere. Overall an acceptable, unrestored copy of a book frequently read to destruction. Through the Looking-Glass in better shape, light bumping and cockling with slight wear to rear joint, hinges splitting but still firm, some instances of light foxing and finger-soiling to contents. A very good copy. First published editions of both Alice in Wonderland books. Adventures in Wonderland is the first published edition, the second overall: the book was originally printed in Oxford at the Clarendon Press in June 1865, but was suppressed when Carroll heard that the book's illustrator was dissatisfied with the quality of the printing. He recalled the few pre-publication copies he had sent out to his friends and donated them to hospitals, where most perished. Only 23 of those original "1865 Alices" are now extant, mostly in institutional holdings, thus creating one of the most famous black tulips of book collecting. The book was entirely reset by Richard Clay for the present authorized Macmillan edition, the earliest edition that can be realistically obtained. Although dated 1866, the edition was in fact ready by November 1865, in time for the Christmas market, and was published in a print run of 4,000 copies. The copy of Through the Looking-Glass is the first edition; like its predecessor, it was published for the Christmas market and bears the following year's date in its imprint. It was actually published in December 1871, in an edition of 9,000 copies. Williams, Madan, Green and Crutch 46; Printing and the Mind of Man 354.