Available Copies from Independent Booksellers
ELIOT George, pseud EVANS Marian. Scenes of Clerical Life. William Blackwood & Sons 1858, 1858.
Price: US$1159.44 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: two volumes, contemporary half-leather over marbled boards, raised bands, leather labels, spines a trifle chipped at head, corners a trifle rubbed, marbled edges, very minor spotting, a handsome set. the authors first novel; first edition; 366 and 381 pages; keywords: fiction - women authors;
Seller: Tiger books, Canterbury, United Kingdom
Eliot, George. Scenes of Clerical Life. William Blackwood, London, 1858.
Price: US$1200.00 + shipping
Condition: Near Fine
Description: Two volumes, bound without half titles. Early half morocco, the attractive spines lettered "Eliot's Works" and the book's title. All edges gilt. Evidently from a uniformly bound set of first editions, but without numbering to suggest a sequence within that set.
Seller: John R. Sanderson, Bookseller , Stockbridge, MA, U.S.A.
ELIOT, George. Scenes of Clerical Life. William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh, 1858.
Price: US$1250.00 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: Octavo, 2 volumes, 366pp., 381pp. Without half-titles. A very good set, very bright and clean internally. Bound in contemporary 3/4 red polished calf over marbled boards, with marbled endpapers and all edges marbled. Corners and outer joints rubbed and a bit dry, and outer joint of volume II with a very thin partial crack; still sound. One of the morocco spine labels on volume I has partial loss, the same on volume II is perished; both gilt-stamped title labels are present and bright. Upon close inspection, there is bookplate removal to a front blank in each volume, though this is not offensive. Despits its evident flaws, a sound, internally clean example of Eliot's first book.
Seller: Cleveland Book Company, ABAA, Rocky River, OH, U.S.A.
Eliot George. SCENES OF CLERICAL LIFE. Edinburgh William Blackwood and Sons 1858, 1858.
Price: US$2035.00 + shipping
Description: 2 volumes. First Edition. With both half-titles. 8vo, in handsome antique full green morocco, the covers with double-ruled gilt fillet lines at the edges, the spines with ornate gilt framed panels between raised bands, two compartments with gilt lettering, additional gilt lettering at the tail and gilt ruling at both tips, gilt ruled board edges and beautifully gilt tooled turn-ins, fine marbled endpapers, t.e.g. 366; 381 pp. A handsome set, the text quite clean and fresh and free from any spotting, a light touch of normal age at the edges, the fine binding in very good and attractive condition, the hinges firm and fine, only a trival bit of wear and the spines mellowed to a very attractive tone of olive. FIRST EDITION, GEORGE ELIOT'S (Mary Anne Evans) FIRST PUBLISHED FICTION AND THE FIRST WORK PUBLISHED UNDER THE GEORGE ELIOT PSEUDONYM. A collection of three short stories. Her partner, G. H. Lewes, in order to help her get her stories written and published, arranged for John Blackwood to publish these first tentative efforts claiming them to be written by a 'friend' named George Eliot. The stories first appeared in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine throughout 1857 and were then first published in book form, as here, in January of 1858. In this complete form it was met with 'just and discerning applause', and considerable speculation as to the identity of its author. Charles Dickens, wrote to the unknown author by care of William Blackwood saying, "I have been so strongly affected by the two first tales in the book you have had the kindness to send me, through Messrs. Blackwood, that I hope you will excuse my writing to you to express my admiration of their extraordinary merit. The exquisite truth and delicacy both of the humour and the pathos of these stories, I have never seen the like of; and they have impressed me in a manner that I should find it very difficult to describe to you. if I had the impertinence to try. In addressing these few words of thankfulness to the creator of the Sad Fortunes of the Rev. Amos Barton, and the sad love-story of Mr. Gilfil, I am (I presume) bound to adopt the name that it pleases that excellent writer to assume. I can suggest no better one: but I should have been strongly disposed, if I had been left to my own devices, to address the said writer as a woman. I have observed what seemed to me such womanly touches in those moving fictions, that the assurance on the title-page is insufficient to satisfy me even now. If they originated with no woman, I believe that no man ever before had the art of making himself mentally so like a woman since the world began." This makes him among the first to suggest the author may have actually been a woman.
Seller: Buddenbrooks, Inc., Newburyport, MA, U.S.A.
ELIOT, George.. Scenes of Clerical Life.. Edinburgh & London: William Blackwood & Sons. 1858, 1858.
Price: US$2125.63 + shipping
Description: FIRST EDITION. 2 vols. Half titles. Handsomely bound in sl. later full dark blue crushed morocco by Birdsall of Northampton, spine gilt in compartments, double-ruled borders & gilt dentelles. t.e.g. A v.g. attractive copy. Baker & Ross A3.2; the first book edition, following the serial publication in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine (1857). Sadleir 818; Wolff 2062.
Seller: Jarndyce, The 19th Century Booksellers, London, United Kingdom
ELIOT, George. Scenes of Clerical Life. Edinburgh: William Blackwood and Sons, 1858, 1858.
Price: US$2450.00 + shipping
Description: Domestic Realism, Pathos, and Humor George Eliot's First Works of Fiction ELIOT, George. Scenes of Clerical Life. In Two Volumes. Edinburgh: William Blackwood and Sons, 1858. First edition in book form of George Eliot's first works of fiction. Two octavo volumes (7 3/8 x 4 5/8 inches; 187 x 117 mm.). [4], 366; [2], 381, [1, blank] pp. Bound without the half-title in Volume I and without the half-title and fly-title in Volume II. Bound ca. 1858 in half dark green hard-grain morocco, ruled in blind, over marbled boards. Spines ruled and lettered in gilt in compartments. Marbled edges and endpapers. Scattered light foxing and soiling. Marginal paper-flaw to leaf H6 (pp. 123/124) of volume 1 (not affecting text). An excellent set of this rather scarce title. Scenes of Clerical Lifeis the title under whichGeorge Eliot'sfirst published fictional work, a collection of three short stories"The Sad Fortunes of the Reverend Amos Barton," "Mr Gilfil's Love-Story," and "Janet's Repentance,"was released in book form; it was the first of her works to be released under her famous pseudonym. The stories were first published inBlackwood's Magazineover the course of the year 1857, initiallyanonymously, before being released as a two-volume set by Blackwood and Sons in January 1858.The three stories are set during the last twenty years of the eighteenth century and the first half of the nineteenth century over a fifty year period andtake place in and around the fictional town of Milby in theEnglish Midlands.Each of theScenesconcerns a different Anglican clergyman, but is not necessarily centered upon him.Eliot examines, among other things, the effects of religious reform and the tension between theEstablishedand theDissentingChurches on the clergymen and their congregations, and draws attention to various social issues, such as poverty,alcoholism,anddomestic violence. "These at once attracted praise for their domestic realism, pathos, and humour, and speculation about the identity of âGeorge Eliot', who was widely supposed to be a clergyman or possibly a clergyman's wife" (The Oxford Companion to English Literature). Baker & Ross A3.2. Parrish, p. 7. Sadleir 818. Wolff 2062.
Seller: David Brass Rare Books, Inc., Calabasas, CA, U.S.A.
George Eliot. Scenes of a clerical life. William Blackwood, 1858.
Price: US$3000.00 + shipping
Condition: Good
Description: "Scenes of Clerical Life" by George Eliot. William Blackwood, 1858 first UK edition. Complete 2 vol., first edition in book form, half-titles, divisional fly-titles, contemporary ink ownership inscription to half-titles and titles, some light finger soiling to margins, original purple cloth by Edmonds & Remnants (Baker & Ross variant A), sympathetically rebacked with original back-strip laid down (slight wear visible to spine ends), some light scuffing, slipcase ? First edition, one of only 1050 copies printed, of Eliot's first foray into fiction. The collection of three novellas was well-received during its first publication in Blackwood's Magazine in 1857; they explore themes later characteristic of her work and give origin to her 'nom de plume'. One of George Eliot's rarest works especially in original publisher's binding.
Seller: Neverland Books, waalre, Netherlands
Price: US$6119.25 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: VG, 1st ed, 1858. The Authors rarest book, especially in the original cloth, as is this. 2 Vols, maroon embossed cloth by Edmonds & Remnants, light wear along front edges, corners bumped. Spines, faded slightly, frayed along edges, some loss. Internally, Vol 1, 1858, half title, [6], [3], 4-366 pp. Vol 2, 1858, half title, [6], [1], 2-381 pp. Bookplates to fpds (Alfred Gilbey), ink ownership signature to feps (Mrs WP Goode), maroon endpapers, small bookbinder label to ep of V1, occasional light spotting & edge browning, short margin crease to V1, X5/X5. 1050 copies printed 5 January 1858, then later a further 650 copies printed for subscription. Housed in a modern up-and-over half maroon morocco over marbled boards, gilt tooling & titles.(Folios, 124*199 & 124*200 mm). (Sadleir 818. Wolff 2062. Baker & Ross A3.2B). These 3 stories were published, serially in Blackwoods Magazine between January & October 1857, anonymously. She earned £443 as a result, & the stories were widely praised. They were then published in book form in 1858. She appears to have earned £45,343 by the time of her death! Story Titles are: The Sad Fortunes of the Reverend Amos Barton. Mr Gilfil's Love-Story. and Janet's Repentance.
Seller: Madoc Books (ABA-ILAB), Llandudno, CONWY, United Kingdom
Price: US$9500.00 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: First edition, first printing. Rare in the publisher's original maroon cloth binding with boards decorated in blind and spine lettered in gilt. Very Good with rubbing to cloth and sunning to spines, front cover of Volume I lightly spotted. Previous owner names to front free endpaper and half-title page of Volume II. Pages toned. A lovely copy of the Eliot's first book, published when she was 38. Upon reading it, Charles Dickens wrote to the publishers praising it, and correctly guessed that the author was a woman writing under a male pseudonym.
Seller: Burnside Rare Books, ABAA, Portland, OR, U.S.A.
Price: US$21256.34 + shipping
Description: First edition in book form of George Eliot's first published work of fiction, collecting three short stories previously serialized in Blackwood's Magazine from January to November 1857. Sadleir, writing in 1951, remarks that the book "in any state is now rare", and ranks it as the scarcest of Eliot's novels to find in the original cloth. These tales, centering around three provincial clergymen, focus less on theological issues than on the ethical problems they face in their daily lives, foreshadowing many of the themes addressed in Eliot's later masterpiece Middlemarch (1871-2). The stories, "with their deft contextualizing and strong dialogue, indicated the arrival of a fresh new talent among Victorian writers of fiction" (ODNB). Eliot began to write the first story in September 1856 and, two months later, G. H. Lewes submitted a manuscript to Blackwood noting it was the work of an "unnamed friend". The publisher accepted the work and, at the beginning of February 1857, the author identified herself as "George Eliot" but also acknowledged this was "a non de plume". The first book edition was published on 5 January 1858. Provenance: ownership inscriptions "J. Power Pemb: Coll:" on front free endpapers. This was likely John Power (1819-1880), a tutor at Pembroke College, Cambridge, between 1852 and 1870, and later appointed master. He was twice vice-chancellor of the University of Cambridge. Sadleir noted that Scenes of Clerical Life "had a success with a small intelligent public". Baker & Ross A3.2 (1,050 copies); Parrish, p. 7, Sadleir, XIX Century Fiction, 818, Wolff 2062. 2 volumes, octavo. Original claret morocco-grain cloth by Edmonds & Remnants, spine lettered in gilt and decorated in blind, foliate decoration on covers in blind, cinnamon-colour endpapers, binder's label on rear pastedown (Baker & Ross's "D" binding). Housed in a custom cloth solander box. Old bookseller's receipt loosely inserted. Spines just lightly sunned, extremities rubbed, corners bumped, hinges cracked but holding, occasional light mark to margins, otherwise generally clean. A very good, fresh copy.
Seller: Peter Harrington. ABA/ ILAB., London, United Kingdom