first edition
1850
by Dickens, Charles
1850. [in the original cloth] With Illustrations by H.K. Browne. London: Bradbury & Evans, 1850. 12 pp ads dated Nov 1860. Original blind-stamped olive green cloth.
First Edition of Dickens's most autobiographical tale, told in the first person -- and along with OLIVER TWIST, A CHRISTMAS CAROL and GREAT EXPECTATIONS, one of his most beloved stories today. COPPERFIELD originally appeared in 20-in-19 monthly serial parts from May 1849 through November 1850; it was then published in book form, as here, on 14 November 1850. Included are the forty "Phiz" plates (including frontispiece and vignette title). This copy is still in the primary olive-green cloth binding, with the "sixteen-bead" style of blind-stamping on the covers. Included is the six-line errata leaf, bound in after the list of plates. The vignette title page is in the first state, with "Bradbury & Evans" and the date 1850 (later copies read "Chapman & Hall," with no date). On the other hand, this copy includes a twelve-page ad catalogue bearing the date November 1860, which lists Dickens's titles from the 1850s (among others) -- indicating that this set of first-edition sheets was not actually bound up until a decade later. This volume is in very good condition: externally there is minor wear at the extremities but otherwise the delicate cloth is intact, with the spine somewhat sunned as always; the original delicate pale-yellow-coated endpapers are cracked at the gutters, again as is almost always the case with this hefty 624-page novel; and there is some (mainly marginal) foxing on the "Phiz" plates, yet again as usual due to the paper used in 1850. A few gatherings stand slightly proud (though the volume is tight), and there is a fingernail-sized chip in the edge of the half-title leaf. As with all of Dickens's books that first appeared in parts, DAVID COPPERFIELD is far more common in wrappered parts than it is in this original cloth -- because the cloth binding was not nearly strong enough to hold such a hefty book together. Sadleir in fact considered this to be THE toughest of all of Dickens's novels to find fine in original cloth -- and that was more than seventy years ago. Smith I pp 74-78; Podeschi (Yale) A122; Carr (UTexas) B222; Sadleir 686 (and p. 377). Provenance: endpaper inscription to Mary Edmunds dated "Xmas 1860" (tying in with the ad date). (Inventory #: 15653)
First Edition of Dickens's most autobiographical tale, told in the first person -- and along with OLIVER TWIST, A CHRISTMAS CAROL and GREAT EXPECTATIONS, one of his most beloved stories today. COPPERFIELD originally appeared in 20-in-19 monthly serial parts from May 1849 through November 1850; it was then published in book form, as here, on 14 November 1850. Included are the forty "Phiz" plates (including frontispiece and vignette title). This copy is still in the primary olive-green cloth binding, with the "sixteen-bead" style of blind-stamping on the covers. Included is the six-line errata leaf, bound in after the list of plates. The vignette title page is in the first state, with "Bradbury & Evans" and the date 1850 (later copies read "Chapman & Hall," with no date). On the other hand, this copy includes a twelve-page ad catalogue bearing the date November 1860, which lists Dickens's titles from the 1850s (among others) -- indicating that this set of first-edition sheets was not actually bound up until a decade later. This volume is in very good condition: externally there is minor wear at the extremities but otherwise the delicate cloth is intact, with the spine somewhat sunned as always; the original delicate pale-yellow-coated endpapers are cracked at the gutters, again as is almost always the case with this hefty 624-page novel; and there is some (mainly marginal) foxing on the "Phiz" plates, yet again as usual due to the paper used in 1850. A few gatherings stand slightly proud (though the volume is tight), and there is a fingernail-sized chip in the edge of the half-title leaf. As with all of Dickens's books that first appeared in parts, DAVID COPPERFIELD is far more common in wrappered parts than it is in this original cloth -- because the cloth binding was not nearly strong enough to hold such a hefty book together. Sadleir in fact considered this to be THE toughest of all of Dickens's novels to find fine in original cloth -- and that was more than seventy years ago. Smith I pp 74-78; Podeschi (Yale) A122; Carr (UTexas) B222; Sadleir 686 (and p. 377). Provenance: endpaper inscription to Mary Edmunds dated "Xmas 1860" (tying in with the ad date). (Inventory #: 15653)
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