Search Results: Titles starting with J from Sumner & Stillman

1918. [inscribed by Stephen Vincent Benét] New York: The Macmillan Company, 1918. 6 pp undated ads. Original red cloth. First American Edition of this novel published a few months before the Armistice. It was an unpleasant book, turgid, didactic and cantankerous: one critic called it a "hymn of hate." It covered the years from 1893 to 1918, and though it was notionally the story of the education of Joan and Peter the book was dominated by the sour-tempered diatribes of Oswald, the scientist, empire-builder and educator. Oswald is a disappointed man, who vents his spleen on everything and everyone... H.G. had been living through a world disaster, and after four years his accumulated resentment at the "uneducated blockheads" who had caused it -- and who still refused to heed his warnings -- poured out in a torrent of recrimination [Mackenzie]. Near-fine condition (spine gilt dull as usual for this wartime book, rear endpaper cracked). See Wells Soc. 69 and Hammond A15. This copy is inscribed by the… Read More

1895. With 20 Illustrations by F. S. Wilson. London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1895. 24 pp ads dated Aug 1895. Original dark blue-green cloth, beveled. First Edition of this novel about a "shopgirl with a past." It was serialized as THE WAY OF THE TRANSGRESSOR, but its title was changed when it was pointed out that another writer's book had an almost identical title. Like the earlier BEATRICE (1890), this novel is in effect an account of the problems brought on by the indissolubility of marriage -- a question much on Haggard's own mind at the time, as the woman he loved was not his wife. This is a bright copy, fine except for occasional minor foxing and a very faint cover mark. Scott 27.

1879. London: Chapman & Hall, 1879. Original scarlet cloth decorated in black. First Edition, third binding state (three-volumes-in-one), of this adventurous tale. "The plot is one of his most interesting, ingenious, elaborate, and unexpected" [Walpole]. John Caldigate goes to Australia to seek his fortune in the gold mines, and winds up living with one Euphemia Smith; after his return to England and his subsequent marriage, Euphemia tracks him down to blackmail him, saying he was already married to her. A postal clerk, of all people, carries the day by proving that an envelope addressed by Caldigate to Euphemia as "Mrs. Caldigate" is a forgery. In all, one of Trollope's better yarns -- featuring, in a way, himself!. (Trollope began as a postal clerk at age 19 (in 1834), and continued rising in the organization until 1866; he is credited as being an originator of the British circular red postal box, after the postal service sent him to the Channel Islands to come up with a better way for residents… Read More

1903. By Hermann Sudermann. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1903. Original dark grey-green paper-covered boards decorated in gilt. First (and only) Edition in English, first (American) issue but with title page dated 1903 rather than 1902. Wharton agreed to translate this play only reluctantly, perhaps drawn by a topic she would later express in her own novels: the plight of a woman who is unhappy in her marriage due to her love for another man. In her Translator's Note, she indicates that she had to exercise some creativity in her task, because "to English and American spectators the long German speeches are a severe strain on the attention"; this is perhaps why Wharton's bibliographer Garrison lists this play as one of Edith Wharton's works -- and in fact, she is sometimes referred to as the co-author of the play. Garrison lists a first Scribner printing published in October-November 1902 (and so dated) -- followed in April 1903 by more copies of this printing issued as the first British… Read More

1896. With an Etching by H. Macbeth-Raeburn and a Map of Wessex. (London:) James R. Osgood, McIlvaine & Co., (1896). Original dark blue-green cloth with front cover monogram device in gilt. First Edition of Hardy's last great novel, issued as Vol. VIII of "The Wessex Novels." Titled HEARTS INSURGENT at the time of its serial appearance, the book was ahead of its time: the 1890s public was not ready for Hardy's depiction of Jude and his cousin Sue settling down together and having two children (though unmarried) -- let alone, the death by hanging of his child and their two. After TESS OF THE D'URBERVILLES (1891) and then JUDE (and due to the outcry over them), Hardy was to spend his remaining 30+ years writing only verse. In this copy, the last pages of chapters are numbered in gatherings "A" through "H" excepting "B" (such pages are never numbered in gatherings "I" onward). In most copies, as here, some but not all of the first eight gatherings have numbered pages, presumably before sheets were… Read More

1894. Decorated by J. Lockwood Kipling, C.I.E. New York: The Century Co., 1894. Original olive-green cloth decorated in gilt. First American Edition, published on the same day (May 22nd) as the English edition. Many of the illustrations are by John Lockwood Kipling, Rudyard's father. This book and THE SECOND JUNGLE BOOK, along with KIM and JUST SO STORIES, constitute Kipling's best-loved work: For there is a unique magic in the JUNGLE BOOKs from the moment the infant Mowgli enters the wolf's lair, and the moonlight is blacked out at the mouth of the cave by the great head of the tiger Shere Khan, and his roar fills it with thunder. There is magic too in the jungle, so glowingly portrayed, with its danger-haunted thickets, and the monkeys threading its frail liana ways, the enchanted land of which Mowgli is to become the master; and in the animals who are his friends and mentors -- Bagheera, the sleek and terrible panther; Baloo, the wise old bear; Hathi, the elephant; Kaa, the gigantic python who… Read More