Le Morte Darthur - Sir Thomas Malory's Book of King Arthur and of His Noble Knights of The Round Table - in Two Volumes
by Sir Thomas Malory
- Used
- Hardcover
- Condition
- G+/N/a
- Seller
-
Lutterworth, Leicestershire, United Kingdom
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
London: Macmillan, 1900. Two-volume set in the "Library of English Classice" series. Red covers with gilt and blind-stamped leaf borders on upper boards. Rough-cut edges. Vol 1: 439pp inc index, plus 2pp adverts; Vol 2: 531pp inc index, plus 2pp adverts. Both volumes in similar condition with wear and bumping to head and foot of spines, which are dulled. Dusty page edges and prelims are foxed. Upper hinge of Vol 1 is cracked, burt holding well. Upper board of Vol 2 has some damp stains. Otherwise a solid set. Ref:104533. Reprint. Cloth. G+/N/a. 15x23cm.
Synopsis
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Reviews
On Jul 30 2014, SimonTremarco said:
The Norton Critical Edition edition by Stephen Shepherd makes for an ideal presentation of Malory, one that strongly evokes the experience of reading the original Winchester manuscript, but at the same time gives plenty of help for the modern reader. Introduction, explanatory notes and glossary are finely judged. Note that this edition is in original spelling and is unabridged: a lower degree of difficulty can be found in Helen Cooper's abridged, modern-spelling edition (Le Morte Darthur: The Winchester Manuscript (Oxford World's Classics)).
The editor expresses some hesitation (p. xii) over the decision to break the text up into modern paragraphs, and not simply to reproduce the manuscript's placement of paragraph symbols in unbroken text. It's not a big issue, but I for one would have found this method attractive, the bold paragraph symbols (as I imagine) breaking up the text adequately and giving an even more distinctive, manuscript-like feel to it.
The only thing that slightly detracts from the book for me is the typesetting of the verso pages (the left-hand pages of each opening), which goes against traditional practice. Since the text is prose, set justified left and right, the marginal annotations of the left-hand pages could easily have been placed in the outer margin, in a mirror image of the right-hand pages. As it is there is a stark, mostly empty space along the inner edge of the left page, while the text comes to within a few millimetres of the outer edge, disturbing to the eye and leaving no thumb-room. Poetry has to be set this way, of course, with its ragged right edge - and in any case the narrower columns of text are easier to keep clear of the page's edge. But if this is Norton house style for prose, I can't see why it's necessary.
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Details
- Bookseller
- Church Street Books (GB)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 004533
- Title
- Le Morte Darthur - Sir Thomas Malory's Book of King Arthur and of His Noble Knights of The Round Table - in Two Volumes
- Author
- Sir Thomas Malory
- Format/Binding
- Hardcover
- Book Condition
- Used - G+
- Jacket Condition
- N/a
- Edition
- Reprint
- Publisher
- Macmillan
- Place of Publication
- London
- Date Published
- 1900
- Note
- May be a multi-volume set and require additional postage.
Terms of Sale
Church Street Books
payment with order. Refund if description inaccurate
About the Seller
Church Street Books
Biblio member since 2007
Lutterworth, Leicestershire
About Church Street Books
Second-hand book dealer (formerly in a Diss Shop), with a stock of around 2000 books from modern quality literature to reference, aviation, classics and antiquarian
Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- Hinge
- The portion of the book closest to the spine that allows the book to be opened and closed.
- Gilt
- The decorative application of gold or gold coloring to a portion of a book on the spine, edges of the text block, or an inlay in...
- Foxed
- Foxing is the age related browning, or brown-yellowish spots, that can occur to book paper over time. When this aging process...
- Cloth
- "Cloth-bound" generally refers to a hardcover book with cloth covering the outside of the book covers. The cloth is stretched...
- Edges
- The collective of the top, fore and bottom edges of the text block of the book, being that part of the edges of the pages of a...
- Cracked
- In reference to a hinge or a book's binding, means that the glue which holds the opposing leaves has allowed them to separate,...
- Reprint
- Any printing of a book which follows the original edition. By definition, a reprint is not a first edition.