Beatrix Potter's The Tale of Peter Rabbit: a new printing, from the original line-blocks made for the first Private Edition of 1901. Introduced by Maurice Sendak

Beatrix POTTER

Published by Kingston, New York: Battledore, 1995

About this Item

Wrappers. Edition limited to 250 numbered copies (and 25 copies hors commerce) signed by Maurice Sendak and by Iain Bain, who supervised the project; this copy unnumbered and unsigned, from the library of Iain Bain and with proofs, printed in black and numbered in pencil by Bain, of 32 of 34 of the prints that accompanied the monograph (the edition as published issued each image, printed in brown on handmade paper and in its own folder, the 34 in a folding box). Those lacking are 13, "Whom should he meet but Mr. Macgregor", and 34, "Bread and milk and blackberries for supper" (Bain's pencil numbering, to 42, does not correspond with that in the printed monograph). "No doubt," writes Sendak, "Beatrix Potter would have bristled at my quick association to Jane Austen when first examining these extraordinary images reproduced here: restrikes of all the surviving linecut zinc plates (34 of a total 42) that were used for printing the original 1901 private edition of The Tale of Peter Rabbit. She would have mocked my 'fanciful' connection. Potter had a firm, steady, but modest view of her own talents. She was also known to write furious, even rude letters to gushing admirers, such as the one to poor Janet Adam Smith in 1943 which witheringly concludes: '. . . And for goodness sake don't write any more rubbish about me . . .'".

Seller Inventory # 28M100393

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Beatrix Potter's The Tale of Peter Rabbit: a new printing, from the original line-blocks made for the first Private Edition of 1901. Introduced by Maurice Sendak
• Publisher: Kingston, New York: Battledore
• Publication Date: 1995
• Binding: Soft cover
• Condition: Fine
• Seller catalogs:
  • Proofs