Available Copies from Independent Booksellers
Lord Alfred Douglas.. The Autobiography of Lord Alfred Douglas.. London, Martin Secker., 1929.
Price: US$120.59 + shipping
Description: First Edition. 21 x 17 cm. (4), 340 pages. Complete with 8 Plates, as listed. Original blue textured cloth. Gilt title on front board and spine. Rebacked in 2024 using the original board and spine. New end papers. Very good condition. Some shelf wear, rubbing and bumping (see images). Sound binding (rebacked). Edges dust dulled. Internally clean. Lord Alfred Bruce Douglas (1870 - 1945), also known as Bosie Douglas, was an English poet and journalist, and a lover of Oscar Wilde. At Oxford he edited an undergraduate journal, The Spirit Lamp, that carried a homoerotic subtext, and met Wilde, starting a close but stormy relationship. Douglas's father, the Marquess of Queensberry, abhorred it and set out to humiliate Wilde, publicly accusing him of homosexuality. Wilde sued him for criminal libel, but some intimate notes were found and Wilde was later imprisoned. On his release, he briefly lived with Douglas in Naples, but they had separated by the time Wilde died in 1900. Douglas married a poet, Olive Custance, in 1902 and had a son, Raymond. On converting to Catholicism in 1911, he repudiated homosexuality, and in a Catholic magazine, Plain English, expressed openly antisemitic views, but rejected the policies of Nazi Germany. He was jailed for libelling Winston Churchill over claims of World War I misconduct. Douglas wrote several books of verse, some in a homoerotic Uranian genre. The phrase "The love that dare not speak its name" appears in one (Two Loves), though it is widely misattributed to Wilde. Sprache: english.
Seller: West Coast Rare Books, Westport, MAYO, Ireland
Price: US$500.00 + shipping
Description: 340 pp. 8vo, publisher's cloth in dust jacket. First edition. A near fine copy in an attractive jacket with some chipping to two corners and the extremities of the spine (not affecting any lettering). The jacket has a few neat internal repairs. It is extremely uncommon in our experience.
Seller: Jeffrey H. Marks, Rare Books, ABAA, Rochester, NY, U.S.A.
Douglas, Lord Alfred. The Autobiography of Lord Alfred Douglas. Martin Secker, London, 1929.
Price: US$1500.00 + shipping
Condition: Near Fine
Description: Hardcover. First Edition. DEDICATION COPY, inscribed "W. Sorley Brown from his friend Alfred Douglas." The printed dedication page reads "To William Sorley Brown," whose ownership stamp is present on the front pastedown. An ardent admirer and long-time friend of Douglas, Brown published a brief work titled The Genius of Lord Alfred Douglas in 1913 with the intention of highlighting Douglas's poetical prowess at a time when most people knew him only for his scandalous affair with Oscar Wilde. Editor and owner of The Border Standard, Brown was known primarily for being a journalist. He is mentioned on page 268 and 292-3 of this book. Near fine condition in the original blue cloth with gilt title to spine and front board. This book has been expertly recased using the original cloth. Light rubbing to spine ends, hinges, and corners. Browning to a few pages where a bookmark was once laid in and light rubbing to pastedowns; otherwise, the interior is clean. Includes frontispiece photograph of Douglas. 340 pages plus index. LIT/020309.
Seller: The Kelmscott Bookshop, ABAA, Savage, MD, U.S.A.