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Melville, Herman. Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life, During a Four Months' Residence in a Valley of the Marquesas; the Revised Edition, with a Sequel. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1849.

Price: US$150.00 + shipping

Condition: Good

Description: 12mo nicely rebound in brown cloth with morocco spine label. xiv, 307 pp., with 8 pages of advertisements and map of the Marquesas Islands. Internally Good with significant foxing to contents and water-staining to lower corner, affecting about a third of the page, with occasional creasing to pages. While the water-staining is a considerable defect, this still remains a worthwhile copy of an early Melville rarity. [+]

Seller: Mausoleum Books, Glendale, CA, U.S.A.

Herman Melville. Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life, During a Four Months' Residence in A Valley of the Marquesas, Rev. Ed. Harper & Brothers, 1849.

Price: US$200.00 + shipping

Condition: Good

Description: Covers worn and water-stained. Title page reconstructed. Pages foxed. Spine chipped.

Seller: Moe's Books, Berkeley, CA, U.S.A.

MELVILLE, Herman. Typee. Harper & Brothers, NY, 1849.

Price: US$250.00 + shipping

Description: First thus, with "The Story of Toby" included. Moderate foxing throughout; insect damage to rear joint; a good or better copy.

Seller: Ken Lopez Bookseller, ABAA (Lopezbooks), Hadley, MA, U.S.A.

Melville, Herman. Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life during a Four Months' Residence in a Valley of the Marquesas; the revised edition, with a sequel. New York. Harper & Brothers, 1849.

Price: US$250.00 + shipping

Condition: Good

Description: Hardcover, 307 pages + 7 page ad for Melville's Omoo + 1 page ad for Harpers New Catalogue. Frontispiece map of the islands. Bound in original stamped brown green boards, faded to brown at the spine. Spine strip is held in place by 4 bands of dark library tape. Gutter at rear endpaper is sprung. Pages good and white, with some mild foxing and mild wrinkle from age. A fine candidate for a new binding, though it's readable as-is. With conservation, the entire original binding could be saved. This is the revised edition of Melville's first book.

Seller: Riverby Books, Fredericksburg, VA, U.S.A.

MELVILLE, Herman.. Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life, during a Four Months' Residence in a Valley of the Marquesas.. Harper & Brothers, New York, 1849.

Price: US$350.00 + shipping

Description: xiv, 307 [8, ads] pp. 12mo, original embossed plum cloth. The revised edition, with a sequel. BAL 13722 Old ink ownership signature; shelf-slanted; spine sunned; extremities rubbed; and some very light foxing throughout.

Seller: Jeffrey H. Marks, Rare Books, ABAA, Rochester, NY, U.S.A.

Melville, Herman. TYPEE: A PEEP AT POLYNESIAN LIFE, DURING A FOUR MONTH'S RESIDENCE IN A VALLEY OF THE MARQUESAS. Harper & Brothers, New York, 1849.

Price: US$350.00 + shipping

Description: Octavo, 307 pages, 7 pp advertisements. In Good minus condition. Bound in brown cloth with gilt lettering and blindstamped ornamentation on covers. Boards have head edge of spine chipped off, rubbing to corners, light bumping to corners, and mild edge wear and shelf wear. Textblock has significant brown staining to endpapers and pastedowns, mild to moderate foxing to pages, and light age toning. Shelved Room A. BAL 13722. 1372657. Special Collections.

Seller: Second Story Books, ABAA, Rockville, MD, U.S.A.

Melville, Herman (1819-1891). Mardi: and A Voyage Thither. Harper & Brothers Publishers, New York, 1849.

Price: US$1250.00 + shipping

Condition: Very Good

Description: 2 volumes. [xii]-365 pages; [xii]-387+[8 ad] pages. Small octavo (7 1/2" x 5 1/4") Original blind stamped plum cloth, gilt title to spines, Harpers gilt logo at base of spine with yellow coated end-papers in a three quarter leather in custom made half leather over marbled boards slipcase. (BAL 13658) First American edition. Mardi (the Polynesian word meaning "the world") is Melville's first pure fiction work (while featuring fictional narrators, his previous novels were heavily autobiographical). It details (much like Typee and Omoo) the travelings of an American sailor who abandons his whaling vessel to explore the South Pacific. Unlike the first two, however, Mardi is highly philosophical and said to be the first work to show Melville's true potential. The tale begins as a simple narrative, but quickly focuses upon discourse between the main characters and their interactions with the different symbolic countries they encounter. While not as cohesive or lengthy as Moby-Dick, it shares a similar writing style as well as many of the same themes. Condition: Plumb coloring has faded and spine sunned with gilt dulled, some foxing through out, corners bumped with some light rubbing, previous owner's name in pencil on title else about very good in a fine slipcase.

Seller: The Book Collector, Inc. ABAA, ILAB, Fort Worth, TX, U.S.A.

Melville, Herman. Mardi: And a Voyage Thither. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1849.

Price: US$1750.00 + shipping

Condition: Near Fine

Description: Two volumes. First American edition. Original publisher's blue-green blind-stamped cloth with gilt lettering to spines. A very good or better set with some light wear, some toning to spine, scattered spotting and small stains to cloth, former owner ink signature to first blank of volume II, usual scattered foxing to text. Overall, a very attractive and tight copy without any repair or restoration. Much nicer than usually found. BAL 13658. Mardi is Herman Meville's third book and marks a departure from his first two works, Typee (1846) and Omoo (1847), which are more autobiographical in nature. Mardi begins like Melville's preceding novels with a fictional South Seas whaling adventure story, but quickly changes into a more allegorical and experimental text when the main characters abandon their vessel and travel to a variety of fictional, symbolic countries. Melville's use of poetry and song also makes this text unique. While it was heavily criticized upon publication, Mardi is best understood within the greater context of his entire body of writing. Rather than continue to produce variations of his first two successful novels, Melville pushed himself to improve on his own writing, and, while perhaps not fully recognized in Mardi, this laid the groundwork for his later novels, including White-Jacket (1850) and Moby Dick (1851). This first American edition, published April 14, 1849, was preceded only by the three volume first British edition, published on March 16th of the same year.

Seller: B & B Rare Books, Ltd., ABAA, New York, NY, U.S.A.

Melville, Herman. Mardi: and a Voyage Thither. New York: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 82 Cliff Street, 1849, 1849.

Price: US$2000.00 + shipping

Description: 2 vols. 8vo, original green cloth. Vol. 1: 365 pp.; Vol. 2: 387, [1 blank] pp., 8 pp. of ads. First American edition of Melville's third book. His first two books, Typee and Omoo, were a blend of fact and fiction, inspired by his experiences as a sailor in the South Seas. Mardi, on the other hand, marks Melville's first wholesale excursion into fiction, following the protagonist, Taji, as he travels through mythical South Sea archipelagoes in search of transcendental beauty in the form of his lost love, Yillah. An experimental novel combining metaphysics, allegory, and a satire of modern nations, literature, religion, etc., it was poorly received by critics and general readers alike. Today it is seen as an important transitional work leading to the mature style found in his masterpiece, Moby Dick. REFERENCES: BAL 13658. PROVENANCE: With the ownership inscription of Frederick Halstead Teese (1823-1894), a New Jersey attorney and politician who served one term in the U. S. House of Representatives (1875-1877). CONDITION: Good, minimal rubbing, spines faded, small breaks at head and foot of spine on each volume, closed and scarcely noticeable 1.5" split in gutter along back cover of vol. 1, areas of discoloration to endpapers and the usual occasional foxing, which is more pronounced on the first and last few leaves of each volume; early ownership inscription in ink on endpapers of "F. H. Teese."

Seller: James Arsenault & Company, ABAA, Arrowsic, ME, U.S.A.

Melville, Herman. Mardi: and a Voyage Thither. Harper & Brothers, 1849.

Price: US$2690.00 + shipping

Condition: Near Fine

Description: For backward or forward, eternity is the same; already have we been the nothing we dread to be. ***Melville's third novel. First American edition, first printing. Publisher's blind-stamped brown cloth, spine gilt. 8 pages of ads in the rear of volume II as called for. Bindings a touch skewed, corners and spine ends lightly bumped, usual scattered foxing, endpapers discolored by binder s glue per usual, rear blank leaves excised from volume one and second blank leaf partially so from volume two by the binder as common. Overall, a solid and bright Near Fine set.*** 'Presented as narratives of his own South Sea experiences, Melville's first two books had roused incredulity in many readers. Their disbelief, he declared, had been "the main inducement" in altering his plan for his third book, Mardi: and a Voyage Thither (1849). Melville wanted to exploit the "rich poetical material" of Polynesia and also to escape feeling "irked, cramped, & fettered" by a narrative of facts. "I began to feel . . . a longing to plume my pinions for a flight," he told his English publisher. Mardi began as a sequel to Typee (1846) and Omoo (1847), but changed radically while he was writing it and emerged as an altogether independent and original work. In its combination of adventure, allegorical romance, realistic portraits of characters and scenes from nature, philosophical speculation, and travelogue-satire, Mardi was Melville's first attempt to create a great work of fiction.' (Northwestern)*** [Bibliography of American Literature, 13658]***Please email us for better pricing.

Seller: Anniroc Rare Books, Pasadena, CA, U.S.A.

MELVILLE, HERMAN. MARDI: AND A VOYAGE THITHER. Harper & Brothers, New York, 1849.

Price: US$3640.00 + shipping

Description: 195 x 130 mm. (7 5/8 x 5 1/8"). With 8 pp. of ads at the end of volume II. Two volumes. Publisher's dark brown cloth stamped in blind, title and publisher's device in gilt on spines, original yellow endpapers. Housed in a modern brown linen chemise and excellent matching slipcase with red morocco label. Front pastedowns with book label of Edward McCamus; front free endpaper of volume I and title pages in both volumes with his ink stamp. BAL 13658; Arvin, "Herman Melville," pp. 74-100; See Day, "History of American Literature," pp. 139-40. ◆The usual sprinkled foxing in the text (persistent but not unsightly, and the paper quite white and crisp); first volume with the inevitable slight pushing down of cloth at head and tail of spine, second volume with trivial wear to lower corners, yellow endleaves with the frequently seen gray discoloration, but the set completely solid, with no wear to the hinges, and THE BINDINGS REMARKABLY BRIGHT AND CLEAN. This is an especially pleasing copy of Melville's third novel, notable, in Day's words, for the author's "first stated use of the sea voyage as a symbol of the quest for life's meaning." Like his earlier novels "Typee" and "Omoo," "Mardi" is set in the South Seas. It follows a young man, Taji, who deserts from a whaling ship to explore a Polynesian archipelago, finding and losing love along the way. According to Day, "With this work, Melville went beyond reporting exotic scenes and episodes, and perceived a vision of tragic intensity in Taji's haunted and unsuccessful quest. . . . 'Mardi' began Melville's use of romantic symbolism." The novel was original, but difficult, and did not find an appreciative contemporary audience; however, Melville scholar Newton Arvin considered it "indispensable" to Melville's development as a writer, employing themes and techniques that would find their footing in "Moby Dick.". FIRST AMERICAN EDITION (intended to be published simultaneously with the British edition, but following it by a few days).

Seller: Phillip J. Pirages Rare Books (ABAA), McMinnville, OR, U.S.A.