Fine Images Prepared for the Works of George Eliot

THE GEORGE ELIOT PORTFOLIO, BEING A SERIES OF SIXTY JAPANESE PAPER PROOFS FROM ORIGINAL ETCHINGS AND PHOTO-ETCHINGS ILLUSTRATING GEORGE ELIOT'S WORKS.

(Paris: Estes and Lauriat, 1888). 435 x 300 mm. (17 1/4 x 11 3/4"). [2] leaves of text followed by plates. No. 17 OF 50 COPIES of the Edition de Luxe, printed for the Continent.

Publisher's ivory cloth, upper cover with two bands of gilt knotwork on a red background, gilt lettering, smooth spine with gilt titling and publisher's device, blue printed endpapers, all edges gilt. 60 ETCHINGS AND PHOTO-ETCHINGS ON JAPON tipped onto lettered cardstock. Baker & Ross F8 (prospectus for deluxe edition). ◆A sprinkling of very faint brown spots to tail edge of upper board, a couple of plates with trivial wrinkles or creases, but AN EXTREMELY FINE COPY, quite clean, fresh, and bright inside and out, with excellent impressions of the plates.

This is an outstanding copy of an attractive portfolio containing a suite of plates created for a deluxe edition of the works of George Eliot produced by Estes and Lauriat. In addition to Eliot's eight novels, that edition included collected essays, poems, and a life of Eliot by George Willis Cooke. The plates here depict scenes from "Adam Bede" (six plates), "Mill on the Floss" (three), "Felix Holt, the Radical" (four), "Scenes of Clerical Life" (four), "Middlemarch" (seven), "Daniel Deronda" (seven), "Romola" (seven), "Silas Marner" (one), "Poems" (13), "Essays" (four), and Cooke's "Life" (four). While copies of this portfolio appear on the market from time to time, they are almost always soiled and worn. A pristine copy like the present one, with vellum nearly immaculate and without any splaying, is hard to find.
(ST15050)

Price: $1,900.00