From Munby to Dadie Rylands
LANGBAINE, Gerard.
The Lives and Characters of the English Dramatick Poets. Also an Exact Account of all the Plays that were ever yet Printed in the English Tongue; their Double Titles, the Places where Acted, the Dates when Printed, and the Persons to whom Dedicated; with Remarks and Observations on most of the said Plays. First begun by Mr. Langbain, improv’d and continued down to this Time, by a Careful Hand. London, William Turner, 1699.
8vo, pp. [16], 182, [24], with the additional leaf *L4 but without the final blank; title slightly browned; contemporary panelled mottled calf with drooping floral cornerpieces, rubbed, rebacked; book label inside front cover of A.N.L. Munby, inscribed by him to George Rylands ‘Dadie from Tim 5 May 1948'.
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The Lives and Characters of the English Dramatick Poets. Also an Exact Account of all the Plays that were ever yet Printed in the English Tongue; their Double Titles, the Places where Acted, the Dates when Printed, and the Persons to whom Dedicated; with Remarks and Observations on most of the said Plays. First begun by Mr. Langbain, improv’d and continued down to this Time, by a Careful Hand.
A delightful association copy, from the library of A. N. L. Munby, of a valuable early account of the Elizabethan, Jacobean, and contemporary stage, first published in 1691. The ‘careful hand’ of the continuator was that of Charles Gildon, who includes a (third person) biography of himself in the Supplement. This is one of three variant imprints (the other two being Turner with others).
It was in 1947 that Munby was invited to return to King’s College as Librarian, and in 1964 he became domus bursar of the College, a post once held with great distinction by Dadie Rylands. Rylands himself, besides being a King’s institution, was an associate of John Gielgud’s and a stalwart of the Cambridge Arts Theatre. Munby, ‘although a dedicated collector … could hardly be prevented from giving his books away to those he considered better qualified to own them’ (A.R.A. Hobson in DNB).
Wing L376.