Twenty Scenes from the Works of Dickens, designed and etched by Christopher Coveny

Quarto, etched additional title-page, and 21 etched plates (plate 7 present in two forms, as noted in the Preface); publisher's half roan. First edition and quite rare: the first purely artistic suite of etchings produced in Australia. Excellent impressions, well inked on thick paper, they have a real charm and vitalilty. Coveny, an illustrator and painter of literary subjects, was the first to produce a series of etchings or engravings outside the natural history and topographical genres. This suite of plates shows a mastery of the form and is not only a good example of the art of etching but also a key work in the development of printing arts in colonial Australia. The book was printed by John Sands who, coincidentally, had worked in England on the illustration of Dickens's novels. A self-taught printmaker, Twenty Scenes, published when he was 36 years old, would prove to be Coveny's chief work. The year that it was published he travelled to England hoping to establish himself there as a graphic artist, but suffered a mental breakdown from which he never fully recovered. . Cloth sides of the binding scuffed and marked, otherwise fine, with the text and plates clean and crisp.…