Artist, illustrator, and designer Robert Anning Bell (1863–1933) was an early member of the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society, showing regularly with the group and serving as the de facto official illustrator of its influential art magazine, The Studio . “From the mid-1890s onwards Bell became increasingly successful as a book designer and illustrator. The subjects chosen were usually from literary sources including fairy tales, works by the romantic poets, and the Bible . . . His distinctive style, characterized by dreaming maidens in a setting of symbolist swirls, was redolent of the emerging European art nouveau movement” ( ODNB ). This collection of Shelley’s poems was published as part of George Bell & Sons’ Endymion Series. Octavo (197 × 127 mm). Contemporary blue morocco, spine lettered and decorated with foliate design in gilt within 6 compartments divided by raised bands, boards richly tooled in gilt, each with central rose panel on dotted ground, the roses detailed with white onlay, surrounded by gilt lettered frame containing a quote from Shelley’s The Revolt of Islam , board edges ruled in gilt, wide turn-ins ruled in gilt with foliate corners, book block edges red and gilt. Frontispiece and illustrated title page printed in red and black, numerous black and white illustrations, 30 of which are full page. Gift inscription to front free endpaper, “To my dear Jeffrey on his birthday, March 1921, From his loving sweetheart Kitty”, with a later inscription below, “O. G. Tuckett, April 1940”. Binding square and tight, minor rubbing to extremities, touch of wear to tips, tiny scuff to leather on rear board, contents clean and bright, paper flaw to pp. 271–2; a very good copy in beautiful condition. £3,500 [151611] 179 SHEPARD, Ernest H. (illus.); GRAHAME, Kenneth. “He lay on some cool dock-leaves”. 1931 ORIGINAL ARTWORK FOR THE MOST POPULAR ILLUSTRATED VERSION An attractive example of E. H. Shepard’s work for the 1931 edition of Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows . This drawing is published on page 152 of this edition. It appears in Chapter 7, “The Piper at the Gates of Dawn”, and features Mole relaxing on the river bank. With the success of Winnie-the-Pooh , Shepard became a much sought-after illustrator. One of his first commissions after his work with A. A. Milne was The Wind in the Willows . In 1930 Shepard visited Grahame to discuss the work.
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177 SHELLEY, Percy Bysshe. The Poetical Works. Edited by Mrs. Shelley. London: Edward Moxon, 1839 IN THE PUBLISHER’S DELUXE CLOTH First collected edition, an appealingly fresh copy in the deluxe red cloth. Mary Shelley’s collected edition of her husband’s poetical works established Shelley finally and irreversibly amongst the great poets of the English language. Pirate editions of Shelley’s works had persuaded his father, Sir Timothy, that all hope of obscurity had passed, and Mary was allowed to prepare a proper edition provided there was only a minimum of biographical information. “Mary Shelley brought Shelley into the mainstream of the national culture. He was no longer the author of a notorious banned poem [ Queen Mab ] only obtainable from shops specializing in blasphemy, sedition and advice on birth control. He was the prophet of Prometheus Unbound , one of the most ambitious attempts ever made to uplift life by literature, and of other works such as the ‘Ode to the West Wind’ . . . The notes that Mary added are masterpieces of editing, adding so immeasurably to the reader’s understanding that nobody would now consider printing Shelley’s poems without them” (St Clair, p. 492). 4 volumes, octavo. Original red pebble-grain cloth, spines lettered and decorated in gilt, covers panelled with arabesque decorations in blind, yellow coated endpapers,
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edges untrimmed, vols I–II and IV partially unopened. Engraved portrait frontispiece. Ownership inscription dated 1845 of Charles Watkins Williams Wynn Jr. (1822–1896), at Christ Church, Oxford, to vol. I; his father was a notable friend and supporter of Robert Southey. Spines slightly sunned, sides bright, minor wear to extremities, slight foxing to frontispiece and vol. I title page, contents crisp. A very good copy indeed. ¶ Dunbar, Shelley Studies, 345; Granniss 88; Wise, p. 87. William St Clair, The Godwins and the Shelleys: The Biography of a Family , 1989. £2,750 [152707] 178 SHELLEY, Percy Bysshe. Poems. Introduction by Walter Raleigh. Illustrations by Robert Anning Bell. London: George Bell and Sons, 1902 IN A STUNNING BINDING First Bell-illustrated edition, in a beautiful arts and crafts style binding, with the binders stamp “E.S.K.” to front free endpaper. The front board is tooled with a quote from Shelley’s The Revolt of Islam , Canto fifth: “Our toil from thought all glorious forms shall cull, to make this earth our home more beautiful, And science, and her sister Poesy, shall clothe with light the fields and cities of the free”.
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