LITERARY HOURS: OR SKETCHES CRITICAL AND NARRATIVE ... The Second Edition, Corrected and Greatly Enlarged .. by Drake, Nathan - 1800

Sudbury: Printed for J. Burkitt, 1800. Small quarto, two volumes: pp. [1-6] [i] ii-iv [v-vi] [i] ii [1-2] [1] 2-455 [456: blank]; [1-4] [i] ii [1] 2-479 [480: blank] [i] ii-x, half title leaves present in both volumes, full old calf, rather crudely but soundly rebacked. Second edition, enlarged. A miscellany of poems, essays and short stories, many of the latter being supernatural or Gothic. This 1800 edition has forty '"Hours," nine new to this edition, others here corrected and enlarged. This edition includes "essays on the operation of the Gothic aesthetic and response to various supernatural experiences as well as short tales of terror illustrating his discussion of Gothic narrative theory. 'On Gothic Superstition' (hour number 6 [here number 8]), and 'On Objects of Terror' (hour number 15 [here number 17]), are landmarks in Gothic criticism. The outstanding piece in the collection is the Radcliffean set piece, 'The Abbey of Clunedale.'" - Barron (ed), Horror Literature 1-25. "Drake's place as theoretician of the Gothic no doubt exceeds his talent as a practitioner of Gothic tales. But his work remains important because he is to Gothicism what Edmund Burke is to the whole philosophy of the sublime in art: its most acute critical spokesman." -Frank, The First Gothics 116. Summers, A Gothic Bibliography, p. 37. Tymn (ed), Horror Literature 1-99. NCBEL III 1279. Bleiler (1978), p. 64. Calf worn at edges, some scattered foxing, a sound, good copy. (#138261)