Phantasmion, First Edition (3 results)

Hard Cover. Condition: Very Good. First Edition, (1 of 250 copies only). First edition, and very SCARCE. One of 250 copies printed. Hard cover, 16mo, finely bound in blue three-quarter morocco gilt over marble paper-covered boards, the spine with six raised bands rolled in gilt and blind, with the title to the second compartment. All edges trimmed and marbled. Matching marbled endpapers. (2), 387, (3)pp. Printer London: C. Wittingham, Tooks Court, Chancery Lane. CONDITION: Very Good. Moderate rubbing to board surfaces, splits to head and foot of the outer joints have been repaired. Hinges in order. Foxing to prelims including title page. Otherwise, the text block is remarkably clean and bright, with only a minor blemish near top margin to pages 5-7. A former owner's name in pencil to the verso of ffep. **This work by the English AUTHOR and translator SARAH COLERIDGE (1802-1852), the only daughter of the Romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) and his first wife Sara, was written when she was thirty five years old. She was self-taught in the Classics, as well as French German, Italian and Spanish. As described by her relative, John Duke Coleridge, Lord Advocate of England, in the Preface to an 1874 edition, the work was written on the Author's sickbed in 1837, and consisted of "a small edition [250 copies] of a long fairy tale by an unnamed author. The few copies sold slowly, and were at length exhausted. The book has long been out of print; and even amongst men of letters, and men interested in the character and admiring the genius of Sara Coleridge, it is almost unknown or forgotten."(p. vi) He identifies the scenery in the work as that of Cumberland and West Moreland, "only under a brighter sky and with a softer climate." He concludes: "Indeed the general literary excellence of the book fits it for all ages and readers. The fairies and spirits of the book, its heroes, witches, its maidens and its kings, have been and may be again, household words with intelligent children, and may once more live, as they have lived already, in their minds, and give names and characters to their bright and pleasant play." (p. vii). "Phantasmion," can also be seen as a precursor to the fantasy genre along the lines of George MacDonald's "Phantastes" (1858), and C.S.Lewis's Narnia books. REFS: Bleiler, 246. J.D. Coleridge, Preface to "Phantasmion," (Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1874.) Watson 515. Wolff 1316. Book.

Small octavo, pp. [1-4] [1] 2-387 [388: blank], two flyleaves at front, one at rear, publisher's green cloth, new printed paper label affixed to spine panel, all edges untrimmed, white endpapers. First edition. Limited to 250 copies. A rare precursor of the journey-to-faeryland that has characterized the structure and content of the quest motif in nineteenth and twentieth century fantastic literature. The major literary effort of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's daughter, an important and highly original British heroic fantasy "whose scope is later echoed in Tolkien's LORD OF THE RINGS." - Schlobin, The Literature of Fantasy 224. ". an important precursor of J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth fantasies. Besides the intricacies of plot, character, and genealogy, PHANTASMION has a theme in common with Tolkien's works: the virtues of pastoralism and the disruptive force of industrialism." - Survey of Modern Fantasy Literature III, pp. 1238-40. A remarkable tale, modeled on Edmund Spenser's THE FAERIE QUEEN (1590; 1596), the "first fairy tale novel written in English." - Clute and Grant (eds), The Encyclopedia of Fantasy, p. 210. Barron (ed), Fantasy Literature 2-28. Bleiler, The Guide to Supernatural Fiction 391. Locke, A Spectrum of Fantasy, p. 55. Bleiler (1978), p. 46. Reginald 03174. Wolff 1316. Keynes, p. 60. Several short splits to cloth along outer joints, shallow loss at lower spine end, corner tips worn, several rubs to cloth, a sound, good copy. Most extant copies of this book have been rebound. It is exceedingly scarce in the original cloth. (#166680).

First American edition. First American edition. [xii], 197, 12 (publisher's list); [iv], 204, [xii] pp. Complete in two volumes. Bound in original drab boards over modern rebacked dark brown morocco leather spines lettered in gilt. Very Good+ with slight fading to spines, light scuffing and minor spot at bottom of volume II. Boards are soiled and worn at edges, corners bumped. Fore-edges are typically foxed. Original endpapers have female inscriptions dated to year of publication; old hand ownership markings by women on following prelims as well. Contents lightly toned with minor foxing. This first US printing in the Colman's Library of Romance series is scarce, even more so than the British edition two years earlier. Scarce supernatural fantasy novel by Sara Coleridge (1802-1852), the only daughter of literary giant and poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834). The protagonist is visited by a spectre-like creature who introduces him to a parallel world. Many critics consider this work to be an early precursor to the modern fantasy novel; one critic in 2021 going so far as to dub it "the first fantasy novel." Magill called it "an important precursor of J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle-earth fantasies.".