FOUND YET LOST AND OTHER STORIES

Roe, E[dward] P[ayson]

Published by Dodd, New York, 1892

About this Item

Octavo, inserted frontispiece and decorated title leaf, original pictorial blue-gray cloth stamped in red, yellow and silver. First printing of this expanded edition? FOUND YET LOST, a short novel of the American Civil War, was first published in 1888 by Dodd, Mead. The 1888 edition was published in paper wrappers only, so this 1892 edition may be the first hardcover edition. Although the title page states "and other stories," there is only one story, "Queen of Spades," in addition to FOUND YET LOST. The Reverend E. P. Roe was one of the most popular late nineteenth-century American fiction writers -- and one of the worst (see Quinn, American Fiction, p. 192, who calls his piety "nauseating" and Fullerton, p. 232, who says his novels "cannot be called real literature" but goes on to say "it stands to his credit that he did his work conscientiously, and that he stuck to the humble, fundamental life. This, and his carefully disguised sensationalism, are the explanation of his popularity"). Roe, who served as a Union chaplain during the Civil War, took up writing full-time after his novel BARRIERS BURNED AWAY, based on the 1871 Chicago fire, became a bestseller. His attention to moral purpose made popular fiction more palatable to a nation habitually suspicious of it as frivolous if not downright immoral. "His plots, according to Carl Van Doren, were concerned with the 'simultaneous pursuit of wives, fortunes, and salvation.'" - Kunitz and Haycraft, American Authors 1600-1900, p. 659. See BAL 16931 and Wright (III) 1967, both describing the 1888 first edition and overlooking this expanded edition. Cloth worn at edges, inner hinges repaired, a sound, good copy. (#117223).

Seller Inventory # 117223

Bibliographic Details

• Title: FOUND YET LOST AND OTHER STORIES
• Publisher: Dodd, New York
• Publication Date: 1892
• Binding: Soft cover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Seller catalogs:
  • Victorian Fiction