First Edition of Gulliver's Travels
Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In four parts. [Gulliver's Travels].
London: Printed for Benj. Motte... 1726.
GULLIVER, Lemuel. Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In four parts. [Gulliver's Travels] London: Printed for Benj. Motte..., 1726.
Full Description:
[SWIFT, Jonathan]. Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In four parts. By Lemuel Gulliver... [Gulliver's Travels]. London: Printed for Benj. Motte..., 1726.
First edition, Teerink’s State A, with the following points: Part I, p. 35, line 5 has “Subsidies” correctly spelled; Part III, p. 74 is misnumbered “44;” Part III, G6 is a cancel, with “Part III” at foot; Part IV, p. 52, line 1 has the misprint “buth is.” Four parts in two octavo volumes (7 11/16 x 4 5/8 inches; 195 x 118 mm). xvi, 148; [6], 164; [6], 155, [1, blank]; [8], 199, [1] pp. Engraved frontispiece portrait of Gulliver in the second state, with the inscription “Captain Lemuel Gulliver of Redriff. Ætat. suæ LVIII.” around the oval the the tablet bearing a Latin inscription (printed on paper with vertical chain-lines), four maps, and two plans. With general title-page for each volume, and a separate title-page for parts I, II and IV, as usual.
Contemporary, or almost contemporary full calf. Volumes repaired at joints but not rebacked. Boards double-ruled and tooled in blind. Spine labels lettered in gilt. Previous owner's bookplate on front pastedown of each volume, and on verso of general title-page of both volumes. Inner hinges starting but covers firm. Some minor staining to outer margin of pages 97-137 of volume I. Some old ink stains to page 56 of volume II. Overall a very good copy. Housed in a full morocco custom clamshell.
Gulliver’s Travels, to use the popular title, is one of the greatest satires in the English language—or any language, for that matter. It was an immediate success, which accounts in part for its bibliographical complexity, and has been hailed as a book that “would last as long as the language, because it described the vices of man in all nations” (D.N.B.). Vice not withstanding, and unintentionally, it has become not just a great satirical novel, but a juvenile classic as well.
Grolier, 100 English, 42. Hubbard, pp. 15-17. Printing and the Mind of Man 185. Rothschild 2104. Teerink 289.
HBS 69664.
$85,000.
Price: $85,000.00
Item #69664