THOMAS HARDY FIRST EDITIONS AT
ASH RARE BOOKS
43 HURON ROAD
LONDON SW17 8RE
UNITED KINGDOM

London : Tinsley Brothers, 1872. First edition. Hardy’s scarce second novel, published without an author’s name by Tinsley “in an edition presumably of 500 copies” in June 1872 (Purdy), having been rejected by Macmillan as “very slight and rather unexciting” the previous year. Tinsley recollected it as one of the “best press-noticed” books he ever published – e.g. “the artist is a true and original one ... every chapter, and almost every page sparkles with lively, natural dialogue ... so hard to write; so rare in fiction” (London Evening Standard, 2nd July 1872) – but it sold very poorly and many of the first edition sheets were subsequently remaindered in one volume form.
Two volumes. Crown 8vo (185 x 122mm). [vi],(216); [vi],216pp. Bound, complete with half-titles, in a superior twentieth-century full crushed tan morocco, banded and richly gilt; inner gilt dentelles; top edges gilt; original green cloth covers preserved at the rear of each volume; some very minor wear and a touch of bruising; very faint scratching to rear board of vol. i; a couple of tiny chips and small flaws to text, but overall a very good and clean set in a handsome binding.

SOLD

London : Macmillan & Co., 1888. First edition. Five stories from Hardy, “Fellow-Townsmen” – placed among the finest and most memorable of all his output; “The Withered Arm” and “The Three Strangers” – two outstanding horror stories; the much-admired “Interlopers at the Knap”, and “The Distracted Preacher” – a surprisingly comic cameo. Just 750 copies were printed, and only 634 of those issued in the original two volumes.
Two volumes. Foolscap 8vo (168 x 109mm). [vi],(248); [vi],212pp. Bound, without the preliminary blanks and two advertisement leaves, in an elegant later (mid-twentieth-century) half red crushed morocco, banded and gilt, by Bayntun of Bath; top edges gilt; marbled endleaves; just a touch sunned; one corner very lightly worn; a few faint marks, but overall a very good set.

SOLD

London : Spencer Blackett, 1890. First edition. Three novellas making their first appearance in book form – the first from John Campbell, Marquis of Lorne, later Duke of Argyll (1845-1914); the second from Annie Hector Alexander (1825-1902), and the third – “The Melancholy Hussar” – from Thomas Hardy. The Hardy story originally appeared in “The Bristol Times and Mirror” earlier in 1890.
Crown 8vo (20cm). [viii],(212),[iv]pp. Original pale blue cloth, ruled and lettered across upper cover and spine in black; covers lightly rubbed and very slightly marked; mild bubbling of cloth on upper cover; endpapers a little cracked; a little shaken and slack, but overall still a very good copy of an uncommon Hardy item. Contemporary (1896) ownership inscription of F. W. Wilkinson, and small late twentieth-century bookseller’s label of the Hardy specialist, H. V. Day of Dorchester.

£200

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London : Osgood, McIlvaine & Co., (1896) [i.e. 1895]. First edition : with six of the first eight gatherings in first state, with page numbers on all the partially blank pages. His last, most bleak, and most controversial novel. With an etched frontispiece of “Christminster” by Henry Macbeth-Raeburn (1860-1947) and Hardy’s map of Wessex at rear.
Post 8vo (21cm). (viii),(520)pp. Original holly green cloth, blocked and lettered in gilt; top edge gilt; just slightly rubbed at extremities and faintly bruised; a few scattered spots to edges and endleaves; slight crack to rear endpaper, but still a very good copy.

SOLD

London & New York : Harper & Brothers, (1902). First edition : [one of 500 copies]. A collection of ninety-nine poems – his most extensive collection up to that time – many of them war poems, dating from the time of the Boer War, but others from other places and other times. Includes “The Souls of the Slain”, “The Mother Mourns”, “By the Earth’s Corpse”, “Between Us Now”, “The Darkling Thrush”, “I Have Lived with Shades”, and others.
Post 8vo (21cm). (xii),260,[ii],[2]pp. Original decorative cloth gilt; top edge gilt; just a touch rubbed; endpapers a little spotted, but a very good and bright copy. Pictorial “Faskally” bookplate of Peter and Margery Morris.

SOLD

London : Macmillan & Co., 1914. First edition : one of just 2,000 copies printed of this highly influential collection of over 100 poems – “Maupassant-like vignettes passed through his great contemplative soul ... they strike a new note” (Cyril Connolly, citing this as one of the key books of the Modern Movement). “He places life upon the operating table, and, with an uncannily skilful knife, lays it bare” (The Globe, 26th November 1914).
Crown 8vo (194 x 124mm). [ii],(x),230,[ii]pp. Bound in a handsome recent half green morocco, banded and gilt; original cloth backstrip and front cover preserved at rear; a couple of faint spots, but overall a very good, bright and clean copy.

£400

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