English Literature

Contact Donovan Rees or Zach Larsen

British literature and history from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century, with an emphasis on poetry, fiction, and drama.

We usually have a selection of literary works from the STC and Wing period (i.e. before 1701), and a broad range of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century fiction and poetry, particularly the Romantics. We also have a selection of historical manuscripts, prints and broadsides, and works in translation.

Among important works which have passed through our hands are the editor's presentation copy of Milton's Lycidas, Swift's Modest Proposal, the autograph draft of Byron's She walks in beauty, the autograph manuscript of Jane Austen's only play Sir Charles Grandison, Dickens’s copy of Vanity Fair, Trollope's classical library, and, over the years, some fifty Shakespeare First Folios.

  1. JAYADEVA, and Friedrich MAJER (translator).

    Gita-Govinda, ein Indisches Singspiel ... aus der Ursprache ins Englische...

    Weimar, Landes-Industrie-Comptoir, 1802.

    First and only separate edition of this uncommon German translation of Gita Govinda, a ‘devoutly erotic poem of the twelfth-century Bengali poet Jayadeva’ (ODNB).

    £475

  2. JOURNEY TO EMMAUS (A).

    A sacred Dialogue ...

    Dublin: Printed and sold by Oliver Nelson ... 1751.

    First edition, dedicated to Frederick, Prince of Wales, as Chancellor of Trinity College.

    £650

  3. JOYCE, James.

    Chamber Music.

    London, Jonathan Cape, [1953].

    Seventh printing.

    £50

  4. JOYCE, James.

    Pomes Penyeach.

    London, Faber & Faber, [1952].

    Sixth Faber printing.

    £40

  5. JUVENAL, Decimus Junius, and Aulus Persius FLACCUS.

    Satyrae.

    London, J. Brindley, 1744.

    First Brindley edition, edited by the Irish classical scholar Usher Gahagan (d. 1749). John Brindley began to publish his series of well-printed duodecimo classics in 1744, for which Gahagan edited eleven works before his arrest and conviction for high treason, having become embroiled with a...

    £650

  6. KEATS, John.

    The Poems … arranged in chronological Order with a Preface by Sidney Colvin.

    London, The Florence Press for Chatto & Windus, 1915.

    No. 145 of 250 copies, in the deluxe vellum binding (for 45s); it could also be purchased in japon for a reduced price, and there was a trade edition on normal paper.

    £1200

  7. KEATS, John.

    Endymion. A Poetic Romance … with Engravings by John Buckland-Wright.

    [London,] The Golden Cockerel Press, [1947].

    No. 200 of 500 copies of the Golden Cockerel Endymion (the first 100 specially bound in full vellum); also found in brown buckram rather than red as here.

    £1750

  8. KELLY, James.

    Poems.

    Glasgow, Printed by Aird & Coghill, and sold by John Menzies & Co, 1888.

    First edition, a presentation copy, of a collection of poems many of which were written ‘before the age of nineteen’. There are a number of sonnets, as well as devotional and nature poetry, some folksongs, and topographical works on e.g. the Isle of Arran.

    £100

  9. KIPLING, Rudyard.

    Mesopotamia.

    Garden City, New York, Doubleday, Page & Company, 1917.

    American copyright edition. A poem lamenting the losses of the First World War and calling for justice against the military and political leaders whose decisions and actions sent so many to their death.

    £120

  10. KIPLING, Rudyard.

    Great-Heart.

    Garden City, New York, Doubleday, Page & Company, 1919.

    American copyright edition. In this poem, Kipling casts the recently deceased Theodore Roosevelt as the character Great-Heart from A Pilgrim’s Progress.

    £120

  11. KIPLING, Rudyard.

    A Kipling Note Book, No. 2.

    New York, M.F. Mansfield & A. Wessels, 1899.

    Contains notes on Kipling’s early works, and suppressed editions, and extracts from prefaces to a number of his works. The supplements comprise copies of the cover illustrations for Kipling’s earliest works, as published by the Indian Railway Library.

    £25

  12. LACTANTIUS.

    Opera.

    [Venice,] Vindelinus de Spira, 1472.

    Magnificent incunable edition of the works of Lactantius, a fine product of the first Venetian press, established in 1469 by Johannes de Spira and continued by his brother Vindelinus from 1470 until 1473. This was the fifth impression of the works of Lactantius, the hugely successful North African...

    £25000

  13. LAING, Alexander. 

    The True Hero and Other Poems … 

    Glasgow, Morison Brothers, 1893. 

    First edition, scarce, a presentation copy, inscribed in a shaky hand ‘To Wm J. Robertson / with author’s regards / Alex Laing / 8-4-19’. 

    £375

  14. LAMB, Charles.

    John Woodvil a Tragedy ... to which are added, Fragments of Burton, the Author of the Anatomy of Melancholy.

    London: Printed by T. Plummer ... for G. and J. Robinson ... 1802.

    First edition. John Woodvil was Charles Lamb’s first play (or dramatic poem), regarded by him at one time as his ‘finest effort’, a ‘medley (as I intend it to be a medley) of laughter and tears, prose and verse, and in some places rhyme, songs, wit, pathos, humour, and, if possible, sublimity’...

    £1250

  15. LEWIS, Wyndham.

    One-Way Song. With a Foreword by T. S. Eliot.

    London, Methuen, [1960].

    Second edition, ostensibly an unaltered reprint of the first edition of 1933, but in fact with some changes. Eliot’s foreword is new to this edition. Bridson had reviewed the original edition uncharitably as ‘versified pamphleteering’ in Poetry XLV: 3 (Dec 1934), accusing it of being a satirical...

    £150

  16. LLOYD, Mary.

    Brighton a Poem. Descriptive of the Place and Parts adjacent. And other Poems …

    London: Printed for the Author. Sold by J. Harding … and by all the Booksellers at Brighton, Worthing, and Eastborne. 1809.

    First and only edition of Mary Lloyd’s paean to the attractions of ‘Beauty, and fashion’s ever favourite seat’. The poem vividly portrays Brighton’s dazzling social round: the races, dances at the Assembly Rooms, plays at the theatre, and acrobatic shows at the circus. Particular attention...

    £350

  17. LUCRETIUS. 

    Titi Lucretii Cari de rerum natura libri VI.  Ad optimorum exemplarium veritatem exacti.  Quae praeterea in hac...

    Padua, Giuseppe Comino [for Volpi], 2 January 1721. 

    First Volpi–Comino edition of Lucretius’s famous materialist and Epicurean poem, the most notable Italian edition of the eighteenth century.  The present work is the product of the long-running and fruitful collaboration between the printer Giuseppe Comino and the scholars Giovanni Antonio...

    £450

  18. MACDIARMID, Hugh.

    Stony Limits and Scots Unbound and other Poems ...

    Edinburgh, Castle Wynd Printers, [1956].

    First edition thus, including some poems that were excluded from the original edition of Stony Limits (1932) over libel fears, and the title-poem only of Scots Unbound (1934), correcting the printers’ errors from the first edition. Bridson had reviewed the first edition of Stony Limits...

    £100

  19. MACDIARMID, Hugh.

    A Lap of Honour.

    [London,] MacGibbon & Kee, [1967].

    First edition, published to coincide with MacDiarmid’s seventy-fifth birthday.

    £40