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

London : Edward Moxon, 1833 [but 1832]. First edition. Tennyson’s most important early collection – thirty poems, including the first appearances of “The Lady of Shalott”, “Mariana in the South”, “Eleanore”, “OEnone”, “The Palace of Art”, “The May Queen”, “New Year’s Eve”, “The Lotos Eaters”, “A Dream of Fair Women”, etc.
Foolscap 8vo (174 x 96mm). [vi],(164)pp + advertisement leaf at front and rear. Bound in an attractive later full crimson morocco, banded and gilt, and dated 1900 by Zaehnsdorf; contrasting red labels; inner gilt dentelles; silk endleaves; just a hint of rubbing; slight cracking of endpapers; a few minor marks, but a very good copy of a difficult title.

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London : Edward Moxon, 1855. First edition. A major collection of Tennyson’s poetry (and his own favourite to the end of his days), which added not only “Come into the garden, Maud”, but also “Half a league onward”, “Theirs not to reason why” and “Cannon to the right of them” to the universal canon of most quoted lines.
Foolscap 8vo (165 x 99mm). [viii],154pp. Bound, with the half-title, but without the separately printed advertisement leaves, in an elegant near contemporary full tan calf, banded and richly gilt; all edges gilt; marbled endleaves; some very minor rubbing and faint wear, but a very good copy. Armorial bookplate of A. T. Higginson – seemingly Alexander Tweed Higginson (1842-1912) of Montreal.

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London : Edward Moxon & Co., 1859. First edition : the probably earlier variant state without the printers’ imprint on the verso of the title-page. “The brave Geraint, a knight of Arthur’s court ...” – Tennyson commences his great Arthurian cycle of poems with “Enid”, “Vivien”, “Elaine” and “Guinevere”.
Foolscap 8vo (167 x 100mm). [viii],(262)pp. Bound, without half-title or advertisements, in an elegant contemporary full plum straight-grain morocco, banded and elaborately worked in gilt, by James Hayday (1796-1872); all edges gilt; a touch of rubbing; endpapers darkened at edges; a handful of spots, but a very good copy. Pencilled ownership inscription.

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London : Strahan & Co., 1872. First edition. Two of Tennyson’s Arthurian Idylls, “Gareth and Lynette” – Gareth dreams of knighthood, and “The Last Tournament” – the foundling with the ruby necklace.
Foolscap 8vo (164 x 101mm). [vi],136pp. Bound, without advertisement leaves, in a most attractive contemporary full green sealskin, banded and extra gilt; inner gilt dentelles; all edges gilt; marbled endpapers; light rubbing to joints and edges, but otherwise a very good copy. With the unusual triangular bookplate of Charles A. Hanbury – Charles Addington Hanbury (1828-1900) of the well-known brewing family.

£100

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London : C. Kegan Paul & Co., 1880. First edition. Ballads, poems, sonnets and translations – including “The First Quarrel”, “The Sisters”, “The Defence of Lucknow”, etc.
Foolscap 8vo (163 x 99mm). vi,184pp. Bound in a very attractive full contemporary green sealskin, banded and richly gilt; inner gilt turn-ins; all edges gilt; a few very minor signs of age and use; a sprinkling of spots, but a very good copy.

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London : Macmillan & Co., 1884. First edition. Two plays, the first put on at the Lyceum in 1881 with Henry Irving and Ellen Terry, and the second at the St. James in 1879 with the Kendals.
Foolscap 8vo (18cm). [iv],146,[ii]pp. Original green cloth, ruled and lettered across spine in gilt; slight browning of endpapers, but a very good, bright and unworn copy. With the contemporary armorial bookplate of C. M. Ingleby of Valentines at Ilford – Clement Mansfield Ingleby (1823-1886), the Shakespearian scholar.

£50

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New York & London : Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1903. First edition. Over fifty poems omitted from the Collected Works, or only included in an unreliable text – culled from the earliest editions, from annuals and periodicals – and together “possessing a value much beyond that of a mere collection of literary curiosities” (from J. C. Thomson’s preface). Includes a number of sonnets, as well as earlier versions of some of his best-known works.
Crown 8vo (194 x 129mm). (x),(202)pp. Bound in a lavish full maroon crushed morocco, banded and extra gilt, by Henry Blackwell (1851-1928) of New York; top edge gilt; morocco gilt doublures and watered silk free endpapers; some minor wear to front joint, but otherwise a very good copy in a fine binding by the Welsh-born Blackwell.

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