Bishop's WifeBut still myself
by WILLIAMS, Cicely
- Used
- very good
- Hardcover
- Signed
- first
- Condition
- Very Good
- Seller
-
Leeds, West Yorkshire, United Kingdom
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1961. Very Good. FIRST EDITION, INSCRIBED BY AUTHOR. 8vo, pp. 226, [2 adverts] + b/w plates. Blue cloth, spine lettered in silver. Spine sunned, gentle bruising to extremities. A little soiling to endpapers and, occasionally, to margins, POI to first blank, inscribed by Williams on second blank: "Very best wishes/ Cicely Williams/ June 1985". Else, clean and tight. A very good copy of Williams' first memoir, inscribed in the year of her death. Unusual signed. Cicely Williams (1907-1985) was a long-standing member of the Ladies' Alpine Club and a mountaineering writer, who did much to document and promote the history of women climbers. She contributed to the Ladies Alpine Club Journal, as well as serving as its last Hon. Editor (before it was folded into the Alpine Journal, when the two clubs merged), and wrote the classic account of women mountaineers, Women on the Rope (1973): "the first consecutive story of 'the feminine share in mountain adventure'". From childhood, Williams had been a frequent visitor to Switzerland: "Her climbing was done mostly in the Zermatt area and included the Riffelhorn, Rimpfischhorn and Zinal Rothorn, but it was not until 1953 that she achieved her great desire and climbed the Matterhorn." (Starkey, 'Mrs Cicley M Williams'). Williams' husband, Ronald, was the Bishop of Leicester from 1953 to 1979, as well as the Chaplain of the English Church in Zermatt from 1946-1978, further cementing his wife's connections with the Alpine resort; the couple were close to Bernard Biner, Chief Guide of Zermatt (whose portrait features as the first plate). Williams writes: "Quite early in our engagement we had to make a bargain. Ronald knew nothing about mountaineering; I knew less about theology. On both sides these omissions had to be remedied." The couple began climbing together in England and Williams learned Greek and began a Diploma in Theology; whilst the first two stuck, "There is no more untheologically-minded being in the world than myself. So that whereas today Ronald is a good and keen climber I remain a theological ignoramus. I maintain, however, that I fulfilled my side of the bargain; any girl who agrees to receive Gore's two-volume commentary on the Bible as a birthday present from her fianc has surely done more than could be expected of her." (p.36). Mary Starkey (1986) 'Mrs Cicely M Williams d. 1985' in Alpine Journal: In Memoriam, p.285.
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Details
- Bookseller
- Quair Books (GB)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 2030
- Title
- Bishop's WifeBut still myself
- Author
- WILLIAMS, Cicely
- Book Condition
- Used - Very Good
- Quantity Available
- 1
- Binding
- Hardcover
- Publisher
- George Allen & Unwin Ltd
- Place of Publication
- London
- Date Published
- 1961
- Weight
- 0.00 lbs
- Bookseller catalogs
- Signed & Association Copies;
Terms of Sale
Quair Books
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About the Seller
Quair Books
Biblio member since 2019
Leeds, West Yorkshire
About Quair Books
Based in West Yorkshire, Quair Books specialises in modern literary and visual cultures, particularly alternative, different and radical authors/ artists, presses and histories. We hold a small general stock, with a focus on unusual, interesting and beautiful books, as well as significant books in the history of ideas. Find us online at: quairbooks.co.uk; email us on: quairbooks@gmail.com and Twitter: @quairbooks.
Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- Inscribed
- When a book is described as being inscribed, it indicates that a short note written by the author or a previous owner has been...
- Sunned
- Damage done to a book cover or dust jacket caused by exposure to direct sunlight. Very strong fluorescent light can cause slight...
- Tight
- Used to mean that the binding of a book has not been overly loosened by frequent use.
- Cloth
- "Cloth-bound" generally refers to a hardcover book with cloth covering the outside of the book covers. The cloth is stretched...
- Spine
- The outer portion of a book which covers the actual binding. The spine usually faces outward when a book is placed on a shelf....
- First Edition
- In book collecting, the first edition is the earliest published form of a book. A book may have more than one first edition in...