1899 [1908] The Ballad of Reading Gaol
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Description
An Important Work, Publishers' Original Binding
An unauthorised edition, based upon the seventh printing of the work, which was the first to feature Wilde's name to the title page.
Identified as an unauthorised edition by the lack of a publisher's address to the title page, while Wilde's name appearing to the cloth back strip means that this was published following the death of the original publisher - Leonard Smithers - in 1907, and was the last unauthorised edition produced.
According to Mason's Wilde bibliography, about one thousand copies of this edition were seized by Wilde's literary executor, with litigation threatened, thus ending the production of these unauthorised editions. Mason, 585.
With the inscription 'To Lord Provost Urquhart May 1910' to the front free endpaper. Sir James Urquhart was Lord Provost of Dundee.
A smart copy of the scarce final pirate edition of this important work from Wilde, penned during his incarceration at Reading Gaol, where he had in 1895 been convicted of 'gross indecency'.
Condition
In the publisher's original cloth binding. Bumping to back strip head and tail, with light handling marks and areas of discolouration to the cloth. Inscription to front free endpaper. Internally, generally firmly bound. Pages generally bright and clean, with only the odd spot.
Very Good
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