The "Poems on Several Occasions" of William Shakespeare, together with Venus and Adonis, Tarquin and Lucrece, Remarks on the Poems of Shakespeare, and an Essay on the Art, Rise, and Progress of the Stage in Greece, Rome, and England.
Printed in 1726 by George Grierson and George Ewing in Dublin, Ireland.
A VERY RARE EARLY EDITION OF WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE'S POEMS WITH AN EARLY COMMENTARY AND WITH TWO OF SHAKESPEARE'S WIDELY POPULAR NARRATIVE POEMS FOR WHICH VERY FEW EARLY EXAMPLES SURVIVE.
THE FIRST PRINTING OF SHAKESPEARE'S WORKS OUTSIDE OF ENGLAND!
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All early Irish publications of William Shakespeare are incredibly rare. This is part eight (of eight) of the first works of Shakespeare set to be printed in Ireland, which is also the first edition of Shakespeare's works to be printed outside of England. There were three individual Shakespeare plays printed prior to this in Ireland, with the 1723 edition of Macbeth realising over $31,000 (USD) at auction in 2004. No complete sets have ever sold at auction and there is some evidence from the bibliographer Jaggard to suggest that only 162 sets were originally sold in the 1720s and it is correspondingly incredibly rare with ESTC recording only 8 copies held institutionally in the UK.
Volume eight is the most significant of the set for the reasons ESTC notes with regard to early Shakespearean scholarship:
"Vol. 8 contains the poems, 'An essay on the art rise, and progress of the stage [by Charles Gildon], and a glossary, the whole revis'd and corrected, with a preface, by Dr. Sewell".
[ESTC T63759]
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Size: 10.5 x 16 cm (approx.)
small octavo
Condition:
Probably original full calf binding. Spine rubbed with some discolouration to the label and gilt loss. Some wear at extremities, particularly the head and foot. Joints starting but with both boards attached with the binding secure and without any shelf lean. Some light wear to the boards but they remain generally very good. Shelf and edge wear with some wear to the corners. Bookplate to second front free endpaper verso, facing the first page of text. Lacks main title page else collates as complete in 461pp (numbered) including half titles for each section as called for and the scarce advertisements at the rear for the two publishers. Due to the lacking main title page there is no date throughout the book, but the book follows ESTC and was acquired with two other volumes from this set which will be separately available - these contain a variety of Shakespeare's plays (totalling 11). The text blocks are mildly toned, particularly at the edges of the endpapers as commensurate with the calf binding. Generally the internal condition could be described as excellent, without any loss to text with the entire text block fully legible.
