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Lot 210

HARDY, THOMAS. 1840-1928.
The Mayor of Casterbridge: The Life and Death of a Man of Character. London: Smith, Elder & Co, 1886.

5 December 2019, 10:00 EST
New York

Sold for US$3,570 inc. premium

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HARDY, THOMAS. 1840-1928.

The Mayor of Casterbridge: The Life and Death of a Man of Character. London: Smith, Elder & Co, 1886.
2 volumes. 8vo. Half-titles, single ad leaf at end of vol 1, and 2 leaves in vol 2 (as called for by Purdy). Publisher's smooth blue cloth, stamped in black, spines titled in gilt, gray floral endpapers. Light rubbing to joints, chip to lower inner corner of many pages in vol 1, small burn hole to pp 189/190. Washed out inscription dated 1888 to half-title.

FIRST BOOK EDITION, 758 copies printed, of which 600 were bound at publication. According to critic Albert Guerard, [the main character] "Henchard ... stands at the very summit of his creator's achievement; his only tragic hero and one of the greatest tragic heroes in all fiction. He takes his place at once with certain towering and possessed figures of Melville, Hawthorne, and Dostoevsky" (Thomas Hardy: The Novels and Stories, New York: 1949). Purdy, pp 50-54; Sadleir 1111.

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