Transformation: Or, the Romance of Monte Beni

Leizpig: Bernhard Tauchnitz, 1860. 16mo (16cm). Two volumes in Florentine vellum with black leather onlays and gilt tooling to fronts and spines, titled in blue paint on front boards, all edges gilt; brown, white, and gilt patterned endpapers; [iii]-xii,292pp; [iii]-vi,280pp; 29 albumen prints laid down on inserted leaves. Contemporary bookseller's ticket of Giulio Giannini, Florence. Bookplates of Marlboro College Library, covering other bookplates now illegible; Marlboro College embossed stamps to title pages. Bound without half-titles. Sound, lightly rubbed with mild external dustsoil, partial crack to front joint of vol. II; internally clean, most photographs lightly faded: Very Good.

One of the most popular of several Tauchnitz titles sold as souvenirs in Italian tourist cities, bound in decorative parchment over boards and extra-illustrated with photographs of important sites and statues. The American title (and Hawthorne's chosen title) of the novel was The Marble Faun, but UK publishers altered it to Transformation. Though the latter title was used by Tauchnitz, this copy is titled The Marble Faun on the front covers, suggesting it was marketed to American tourists in Florence. TODD/BOWDEN 515Db and 516Db. CLARK A23.4D.