Available Copies from Independent Booksellers
Hardy, Thomas.. Jude the Obscure (SIGNED).. London: Osgood McIlvaine & Co., 1896.
Price: US$650.00 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: Green cloth with gilt ornament on cover. Large thick octavo. 516pp. Frontispiece and map. First edition in book form of the author's controversial last novel. This is the presumed first issue with the Osgood name on the spine and copyright page and with pagination to all partially blank chapter endings in signatures A through H and none to the chapter endings thereafter. This copy has a card affixed to the front pastedown with a 23-line autograph note by Hardy signed with his initials declining a social engagement. The engraved frontis is by Henry Macbeth-Raeburn and the autograph map at the end shows the Wessex of Hardy's novels. A very good copy with a tear to the top of the spine and some light cover marking. The text is very good with some light soiling and wear. A few pages are chipped at the right edge and one page has a small piece chipped away from the right blank margin.
Seller: Centerbridge Books, Old Saybrook, CT, U.S.A.
Price: US$5000.00 + shipping
Description: First edition of Thomas Hardy's controversial final novel, the eighth volume in his uniform series of Wessex Novels, accompanied by a letter to his friend Edward Clodd reporting his progress on the work. The story of a stonemason whose higher aspirations are brutally crushed, Jude the Obscure was the subject of immediate backlash: "his dreams were as gigantic as his surroundings were small." Hardy's attack on class snobbery and compulsory marriage, and his sympathetic portrayal of a family created out of wedlock, so outraged readers that he abandoned the writing of novels altogether, turning to poetry in his final decades. Tipped into this copy is a four-page letter, dated September 2, 1894, sent by Hardy to his longtime friend, banker and man of letters Edward Clodd. Hardy regrets not seeing more of Clodd that summer, and confides that "the announcement in the D. Chronicle represents me as being considerably more advanced than I am with the tale [of Jude the Obscure.]" Hardy expresses his hope for a "tremendous holiday" in the future: "a night or two ago, when I was standing on the Quay at Weymouth just before the departure of the Channel boat, I felt inclined to walk aboard & go across under the starlight." Hardy also alludes to upcoming renovations at Max Gate: "I have abandoned my first rather extensive plan & am only doing a few things absolutely necessary." First issue, with Osgood's name on verso of title and gilt-stamped spine. Mixed state: signature A with unpaginated chapter endings on pages 7 and 16, signatures B-H with paginated chapter endings. Purdy, 86-91, Sadleir 1108. A near-fine copy of a major novel, with original letter from Hardy concerning its progress. Octavo, measuring 8 x 5.5 inches: [2], viii, 516. Original green ribbed cloth stamped and lettered in gilt, "TH" gilt monogram to upper board, top edge gilt, other edges untrimmed. Etched frontispiece, map of Wessex after text. Bookseller label to front pastedown: "Neal's Library / English Stationery / 248 Rue de Rivoli / Paris." Hinges cracked, lacking scarce dust jacket. Tipped in: four-page ALS to Edward Clodd, on Hardy's Max Gate letterhead, dated September 2, 1894. Housed in a custom clamshell box.
Seller: Honey & Wax Booksellers, ABAA, Brooklyn, NY, U.S.A.