1764 Jerusalem Delivered an Heroic Poem Translated from the Italian of Torquato Tasso

Description

Early Edition, Leather Binding

With engraved title pages to both volumes. Translated into English from the original Italian by John Hoole. Hoole worked as a principal auditor in India when he penned a work on the East India Company's affairs. He translated several works on the side of his works, such as Ariosto's 'Orlando Furioso'. He was a personal friend of Samuel Johnson, and Hoole wrote a work on Johnson's final days for the 'European Magazine'. It is said that the dedication to this work was written by Johnson, despite it being signed a John Hoole. 'Jerusalem Delivered' was first published under the name 'Gerusalemme Liberata' in 1581. The epic depicts an imaginative version of the wars between Christians and Muslims at the end of the First Crusade during the siege of Jerusalem. The work was the basis of Handel's 'Rinaldo' of 1711. Structurally the work comprises of twenty cantos in ottava rima stanzas. With half titles to both volumes. With the bookplate of Sir John Trollope, a British Conservative politician. Trollope was the President of the Poor Law Board in the Earl of Derby's short-lived 1852 Conservative administration.