The Works: Including her Correspondence, Poems, and Essays.

MONTAGU, Lady Mary Wortley.

Published by London: Printed for Richard Phillips, 1803

About this Item

First collected edition. Montagu's correspondence details two periods of her life: 1717 to 1727, which includes the time she spent in Turkey, and 1739 to 1760, which covers her second sojourn in Europe. The Works also includes a selection of Montagu's poems and essays. It was edited by the antiquary James Dallaway, who had travelled in similar areas. As a woman, Montagu had privileged insight to some aspects of Turkish life. Discussing a harem, she writes "I am sure I have now entertained you with… what no book of travels could inform you of, as it is no less than death for a man to be found in one of these places" (vol. II, p. 160). She was particularly impressed by a bath house in Sofia, where she met women in "the state of nature, that is, in plain English, stark naked" who carried themselves with "majestic grace" (vol. II, p. 157). Ten years of Montagu's second European trip were spent in effective captivity. A nobleman named Count Ugolino Palazzi imprisoned her in North Italy, where he extorted her out of large sums of money. Traces of this oppression are evident: on 10 October 1953 (vol. IV, pp. 240-42), she laments that her correspondence is intercepted and read. Montagu brought vaccination against smallpox to Britain from Turkey, where it was already an established practice. She describes its popularity: "Since that experiment has not yet had any ill effect, the whole town are doing the same thing" (vol. III, p. 127). Lowndes, p. 1587. 5 vols, octavo (199 x 126 mm). With 2 portrait frontispieces and 10 facsimile letters. Contemporary red straight-grain half morocco, spines lettered, numbered, and ruled in gilt, pink paper boards with gilt edging, pink endpapers, edges sprinkled brown, purple silk bookmarkers. Bookplates of John Rushout, 2nd Baron Northwick (1770 1859) on front pastedowns. Spines sunned, skillfully retouched, with a few small scrapes, boards faded, offset from leather and faintly marked, contents crisp and clean: a well-preserved set.

Seller Inventory # 177511

Bibliographic Details

• Title: The Works: Including her Correspondence, Poems, and Essays.
• Publisher: London: Printed for Richard Phillips, 1803
• Edition: 1st Edition