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represented Lord Alfred Douglas in 1983 to recover an incriminating letter from a blackmailer. Richard Ellman, Wilde’s biographer, mentions a series of letters sent by Wilde to her during his lecture tour of North America, in which he boasted about his various successes. The American actress and feminist Elizabeth Robins (1862–1952) is best remembered for her most successful play Votes for Women! , which is credited with inaugurating suffrage drama. Wilde met her for the first time at a reception at Lady Seton’s House in 1888 and subsequently used his influence to help her gain success on the London stage. He gave her feedback on her performances throughout her career. Quarto. Original pink cloth, flat spine lettered in gilt, leaf motifs to spine and covers designed by Charles Shannon, edges untrimmed. Spine and head of rear cover sunned, cloth otherwise bright, spine ends and tips slightly rubbed and bumped, tiny mark to front cover, offsetting to endpapers, a few spots of foxing to half-title, otherwise generally clean. A very good, fresh copy. ¶ Mason, p. 433; James G. Nelson, Publisher to the Decadents: Leonard Smithers in the Careers of Beardsley, Wilde, Dowson, 2000. £2,250 [159879] 170 WILDE, Oscar – AMERY, Leopold C. M. S.; Francis W. Hirst; Henry A. A. Cruso. Aristophanes at Oxford. Oxford: J. Vincent; Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co., London, [1894] an uncommon parody of wilde First edition, one of 750 copies printed, of this Oxford play satirizing Oscar Wilde, in an unusual two-tone binding. The authors of this anonymous parody, an entertaining imitation of the classical Greek comedy of Aristophanes, were three Oxford undergraduates led by Leopold Amery (1873–1955), who was to become a prominent journalist and conservative
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169 WILDE, Oscar. An Ideal Husband. London: Leonard Smithers and Co, 1899 wilde’s favourite play, with an appealing association First edition, one of 1,000 copies printed, an appealing association copy, presented in the year of publication from Lady Lewis, the wife of Wilde’s solicitor, to their mutual friend the actress Elizabeth Robins. Lewis has inscribed the front free endpaper: “With love from B[eth]. L[ewis]. Aug. 6th 99, Vulpera”; Robins’s ownership inscription is on the half-title: “Elizabeth Robins from Lady Lewis, Waldhaus (Tarasp), Switzerland”. Waldhaus Vulpera was a popular Grand Hotel in the Swiss Alps. Elizabeth Lewis ( née Eberstadt) was the second wife of Wilde’s long-time friend, Sir George Lewis (1833–1911). A discreet and astute solicitor, he advised Wilde on various occasions, and, on his request,
politician. Francis Wrigley Hirst (1873–1953) became a successful journalist, editor of The Economist and biographer of Thomas Jefferson. Little is known about Henry Alford Antony Cruso, besides that he published another drama in 1907. “The motive of this production . . . is an honest dislike for ‘Dorian Gray,’ ‘Salome,’ the ‘Yellow Book,’ and the whole of the erotic, lack-a-daisical, opium- cigarette literature of the day”, the student-authors write in their preface, though they confess: “We have never met the philosopher in question personally, or seen anything more of him than a distant back- view, and even that obscured by a throng of admiring Adonises.” The play was published in 1894, just before Wilde’s arrest and trial, when he was at the height of his fame. The play is of interest for Wildean studies and is therefore represented strongly in institutions. However, no doubt because many of the surviving copies of this relatively ephemeral production have been assumed into special collections, it is rare in the trade: the last copy to appear at auction was in 1982. Octavo (192 × 127 mm). Contemporary light bluish-green and brown calf, flat spine lettered in gilt, covers panelled in gilt with small flower tools to corners, initials “O.W.” and “Y.T.O” in gilt to front cover, board edges and turn-ins elaborately tooled in gilt, edges uncut. Spine sunned, occasional spots of wear to extremities, trivial marks to covers, contents crisp and clean. A very good, attractive copy. £1,850 [159839]
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171 WILSON, Edmund. Axel’s Castle. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1931 with the rare jacket in exceptional condition First edition, first printing (Scribner’s “A”), in an exceptionally well-preserved example of the dust jacket, which is scarce in any condition. Counted among Connolly’s 100 Books of the Modern Movement , Axel’s Castle is an influential study on the roots of modernism in the symbolist movement, with chapters on W. B. Yeats, Paul Valéry, T. S. Eliot, Proust, James Joyce, Gertrude Stein, and Rimbaud. Octavo. Original blue cloth, printed paper spine label, fore edge untrimmed. With dust jacket. Label bright, contents clean. A near-fine copy in like dust jacket, not price-clipped, spine lightly toned, some trivial nicks to ends and corners but an exceedingly sharp example. ¶ Connolly, Modern Movement , 71. £3,500 [157188]
172 WITTGENSTEIN, Ludwig. Tractatus Logico- Philosophicus. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., Ltd, 1922 a masterpiece of 20th-century philosophy First edition in English, and the first edition in book form, following publication in German the previous year in the journal Annalen der Naturphilosophie. That publication – under the title Logisch-Philosophische Abhandlung – was plagued with errors, to the extent that Wittgenstein told a friend that he regarded it as a “pirated edition” (Monk, p. 205). Wittgenstein corrected the text for this edition, which prints the original German parallel with the English translation by Charles Kay Ogden and Frank Plumpton Ramsey. It was the only philosophical work by Wittgenstein to be published in his lifetime, save for a short lecture printed in the Aristotelian Society journal in 1929. The cornerstone text of logical positivism and
of the Cambridge school of analytic philosophy, the Tractatus articulates the relationship of language and reality, and defines the limits of science. Now universally recognized as one of the philosophical masterpieces of the 20th century, the work was far from an overnight success. Slow sales of those copies bound on publication meant that first edition sheets were subsequently bound up, as demand required, some years later. In this instance, the copy was bound and issued in 1931, with an 19-page catalogue dated that year. Octavo. Original blue cloth, spine lettered in gilt. Parallel text in German and English. An excellent copy, the cloth bright and fresh, internally very clean. ¶ Lapoint, Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Comprehensive Bibliography , p. 4. Blackwell & Ruja (Russell’s introduction) B11.1a. See Ray Monk, Ludwig Wittgenstein: The Duty of Genius , 2012. £8,500 [159157]
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DECEMBER 2022
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