The Collected Works of Charles Dickens
Includes: The Mystery of Edwin Drood (1870); Our Mutual Friend (1865); The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club; Oliver Twist or, the Parish Boy's Progress; A Tale of Two Cities (1874); The Life an Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby; The Old Curiosity Shop; Sketches by Boz Illustrative of Every-Day Life and Every-Day People (1874); Barnaby Rudge; The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit; Christmas Books (A Christmas Carol, the Chimes, the Cricket on the Hearth, the Battle of Life, the Haunted Man); Dombey and Son; The Personal History of David Copperfield; Little Dorrit; Bleak House.
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Edwin Drood and Our Mutual Friend are first editions, others being second or very early editions, with all dating from circa 1860-1874. The Christmas Books volume is particularly rare, containing A Christmas Carol, etc.
The set contains all the above mentioned titles by Charles Dickens. The titles in this set were not originally published as a set, but as individual titles in early edition format, here brought together and uniformly bound in stunning fine half green calf. The titles do not include Great Expectations, but do include all other major works, presumably as originally bound as the one volume edition of that title is very scarce; we have only had it once.
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Size: 147 x 217 mm (approx., each)
Condition:
[frontis, engraved title, t.p., iii-viii, 172pp.]; [half title, frontis, engraved title, t.p., v-xi, 320pp., frontis, t.p., v-viii, 309pp.]; [half title, frontis, engraved title, t.p., v-xiv, directions to the binder, 609pp.]; [half tile, frontis, t.p., t.p., v-viii, 311pp., frontis, engraved title, t.p., iii-ix, 254pp.]; [half title, frontis, t.p., v-xvi, 624pp.]; [half title, frontis, t.p., v-vi, 533pp.]; [frontis, engraved title, t.p., v-vi, 1ff., 526pp.]; [half title, frontis, t.p., v-x, 613pp.]; [half title, frontis, engraved title, t.p., v-xiv, errata, 624pp.]; [half title, frontis, t.p., 3ff., 465pp.]; [half title, frontis, engraved title, t.p., vii-xvi, 624pp.]; [half title, frontis, engraved title, t.p., v-xiv, errata, 624pp.]; [frontis, engraved title, t.p., iii-xiv, 625pp.]; [half title, frontis, engraved title, t.p., v-xvi, 624pp.]
All uniformly bound apart from Edwin Drood which is bound in a very similar manner, thus appearing nicely on the shelf with the rest of the set. This is probably due to this volume being smaller and was almost certainly bound contemporaneously with the other volumes in the set. Half calf over paper backed boards with gilt titles between raised bands, other compartments with gilt tooling. Spines lightly rubbed, more so to extremities. All boards securely attached with rubbing along joints. Boards with very minor superficial scratches and rubbing, some somewhat sunned. Few boards have very small fragments of leather peeling/lacking, see photos for reference. Bindings secure, few volumes with minor shelf lean, remaining upright. Shelf and edge wear. Dulling to page edges, with top page edges darkened as typical. Some leaves stick out past the remaining page edges in some volumes. Text blocks very clean with minor foxing, more so to the first few and the last few leaves, as well as leaves surrounding plates. Most plates very clean with edge toning, some with minor foxing.
Some plates coloured-in by previous owner, probably a child, in the Edwin Drood volume. Pp.201-204 detached in the Pickwick Papers, but present. Plate between pp.296-7 mostly detached and with a closed tear, attached with a small part at the top, but present. Pp.103-106 in Nicholas Nickleby detached and with toning and very small edge tears, but present. Pp.209/210 attached very loosely at the top, mostly detached with very small tears to edges, but present. Plate between pp.389 and pp.399 detached in the Old Curiosity Shop, but present. Pp.259-270 partially detached at the bottom in Dombey and Son. Plate between pp.422 and pp.423 detached in Bleak House, but present.
