Order Total (1 Item Items):
Shipping Destination:
Combe, William ; Cruikshank, George Illus (1 results)
Skip to main search results
Product Type
- All Product Types
- Books (1)
- Magazines & Periodicals
- Comics
- Sheet Music
- Art, Prints & Posters
- Photographs
- Maps
-
Manuscripts &
Paper Collectibles
Condition
- All Conditions
- New
- Used
Binding
- All Bindings
- Hardcover
- Softcover
Collectible Attributes
- First Edition
- Signed
- Dust Jacket
- Seller-Supplied Images
- Not Printed On Demand
Seller Location
Seller Rating
-
Life of Napoleon, A Hudibrastic Poem in Fifteen Cantoes by Dr. Syntax, embellished with Thirty Engravings.
Published by London: Printed for T. Tegg, Wm Allason, & J. Dick, Edinburgh, 1815, 1815
Seller: Peter Harrington. ABA/ ILAB., London, United Kingdom
Association Member: ABA ILAB PBFA
Seller Rating:
First Edition
First edition of Cruikshank's biting satire of Napoleon's life, charting in 30 plates his journey from his dreams of domination in military college to his final exile in Elba - apparently published before his return in the Hundred Days. Throughout the book, Napoleon is depicted as tyrant, murderer, and egotist. The accompanying text is attributed to William Combe, the creator of Dr Syntax, but this is perhaps spurious. The intentions of both artist and author are best summed up by the allegorical title page, which shows the young Corsican as a revolutionary fire-brand in a Phrygian cap ascending a ladder whose rungs are Plunder, Bloodshed and Murder, this last being the blade of a guillotine. At the top he sits in ermine astride the globe, before being cast off, scattering his treasure as he goes, to end huddled in exile. Abbey 356 (with the relevant points of first edition); Cohn 153; Tooley 151. Octavo (229 x 141 mm). Early 20th-century red morocco by W. Root & Son, rebacked with original spine laid down, spine lettered in gilt, compartments decorated with Napoleonic bees and eagles and his crowned initial, the latter device repeated as cornerpieces to covers accompanying ruled frame, gilt turn-ins, pink marbled endpapers. Hand-coloured engraved title page and 29 similar plates; bound with tissue guards. A little rubbed, occasional very light spotting to contents: a handsome copy.
