Lady Susan (facsimile).

Garland Publishing Inc. New York. 1989 (First Edition Thus). Roy 8vo, 185pp. Hardcover in seagreen and cream cloth with darker green embossed title on front board in very good condition with sound spine but minor flecking on front and upper edges and no d/w as issued, protected loosely by clear archival covering, text is in excellent condition devoid of all prior owner markings. Overall, near fine. This is a facsimile of the manuscript in the Pierpont Morgan Library and the 1925 printed edition (on acid -free "250-year-life paper). The excellent preface by Princeton's A. Walton Litz explains its relevance and position in Austen's body of work and artistic life. In spite of the work's complex irony and the skilful management of the fascinating epistolary form (writing in a series of brief notations or epistles), most critics feel that Lady Susan is closely related to but not part of the more mature pieces in the Juvenilia which were written before 1794. In its manners and characters, Lady Susan is a move back into the more familiar world of 18th century satire and comedy , formed out of Austen's literary experience, not the actual world of the 1790s that she knew well. The original autograph manuscript is written on 79 leaves, two of which bear an 1805 watermark, leading to misunderstandings of the original date of writing. It was completed but left unpublished and untitled at her death in 1817, age 42. Passing through multiple owners since 1882, it was edited and published again by the Clarendon Press in 1925 and it is this transcript which is reprinted in this volume following the facsimile in Austen's own hand.