Genoa The Superb. The City of Columbus by Johnson, Virginia W. (1849-1916) - 1892

Boston: Estes and Lauriat, 1892. First Edition, First Printing. A Near Fine Hardcover. Near Fine/Good.

Blue cloth with intricate spine gilting with darker blue titles. Front with similar decoration with seal of the city. Top edge gilt. Bindings are tight and square. Text clean, light even toning. Minimal shelf handling wear. Thick card-stock dust jacket shows shelf and hand handling. Illustrated with 20 tissue-guarded captioned plates. First Edition, First Printing. Printed at the Riverside Press. 8vo; 8.25 inches tall; 298 pages.. Like several other series authors, Virginia Wales Johnson came from distinguished ancestry, in this case the Sewall family; she was also distantly related to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Although her parents are described as Bostonians in several biographical sketches, Virginia Johnson was born in Brooklyn, on 28 December 1849. In 1875, she and her mother and sister went abroad, and Johnson settled in Europe, spending most of her time in Florence.

She continued to write adult novels and stories, which were published in America. The Dictionary of American Biography notes that "[a]fter 1875, her work shows intense love for Italy, both mediaeval and modern," and incorporates a "knowledge of Italian history and literature" as well as of contemporary Italy. Many of her later works, such as Genoa the Superb, the City of Columbus (1892) and Summer Days at Vallombrosa (1911) dealt with "popular history" or travel.

Ref: Dictionary of American Biography; The Literary World (Boston), 3 June 1882: 184.