COPY NO 1 WITH A SIGNED ORIGINAL DRAWING
A Midsummer Night's Dream
Constable, 1914.
First edition. Large 4to. Edition de Luxe. Number 1 of 100 copies in vellum (from a print run of 250). Signed by William Heath Robinson on the limitation page. This copy with a large original ink drawing of Helena, signed and dated by the artist in 1914. Bound in original full white vellum with Heath Robinson illustrations blocked in gilt on the upper cover and spine. Hand made paper, with top edge gilt and others untrimmed. Twelve beautiful tipped in colour plates protected by captioned tissue guards. Plus 46 full page black and white illustrations and 17 smaller line drawings in the text. Both the colour and line drawings to this volume are superb. A near fine copy, bright and clean.
One of the rarest of the Golden Age Gift books, printed in an edition of just 250 of which only 100 were bound in this handsome vellum binding. This copy, being the first of the print run, is likely to have been a presentation copy, hence the presence of the unique original drawing.
When the book was introduced as a Christmas Gift book in 1914 reviews were very favourable, "... some of the daintiest, most delicately finished work that has ever come from [Robinson's] brush. His fairies have the grace and airy lightness that belong to those little people; and he has depicted varying phases of the story with the delightful humour and happy spirit of romance in which Shakespeare conceived them."
Beare 77.b
Stock ID: 38968
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