ALFRED, A POEM. Vol. I.

FITCHETT, John.

Published by London. Printed for Cadell and Davies Strand; J. Johnson St. Paul's Church-yard; James Carpenter Old Bond-Street; and Edwards Pall-Mall, 1808

About this Item

4to, engraved frontispiece and pp. [viii], 464; a good clean copy in contemporary red roan, gilt border on covers, spine lettered in gilt; gilt edges, silk endpapers. (Spine worn, upper joint broken.) First edition of the first part, and a presentation copy from the author. This is the first volume only of what became an extraordinarily long poem of more than 130,000 lines. John Fitchett (1776-1838) was the son of a Liverpool wine merchant, and his poem on King Alfred was the great work of his life: further parts appeared over the years, and a wholly revised version, printed with money he bequeathed to his friend Robert Roscoe, was published by Pickering in 1841-2 in six volumes. Fitchett's biographer in ODNB calls the work a 'prodigious monument of misapplied learning and mental energy' This first part was printed privately for Fitchett at Warrington by J. Haddock, and despite the imprint it seems not actually to have been issued to the public, and it is now very rare. The author has noted at the foot of the title page: '(Privately printed, but not published) J.F.'. This copy was given, many years after it was printed, by Fitchett himself to a lady friend: a manuscript poem on the endpaper is addressed 'To Miss Vernon, with the first volume of the (unpublished) poem of Alfred'. The sonnet which follows - written in antiquated verse of a kind that would not have been out of place a century earlier - is signed by Fitchett and dated November 1836. Copac locates just one copy, at the Bodleian; no copy in WorldCat. Provenance: given to an unidentified Miss Vernon, very probably a local Warrington friend. Offered in 1985 by Robin Waterfield of Oxford in their catalogue 55 (item 130), and bought by E.G. Stanley, Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford.

Seller Inventory # 23106

Bibliographic Details

• Title: ALFRED, A POEM. Vol. I.
• Publisher: London. Printed for Cadell and Davies Strand; J. Johnson St. Paul's Church-yard; James Carpenter Old Bond-Street; and Edwards Pall-Mall
• Publication Date: 1808
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Signed: Signed by Author(s)
• Seller catalogs:
  • Poetry