Fiction

Our Man in Havana – Graham Greene

This the still collectable Reprint Society edition of 1960. Pretty good condition albeit with previous owners name to the front free end paper.

Graham Greene’s masterpiece and a fine encouragement to all vacuum cleaner salesmen.

Greene laughs … as he described it – An Entertainment.

$40.00

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The King’s General – Daphne du Maurier – 1947

Octavo, 368 pages including Postscript and “What Happened to the People in the Story”. Pretty good condition albeit a little age to the scarce dust jacket

A first Australian edition 1947 published by Angus & Robertson. Having been published in the UK the year before.

One of Daphne du Maurier’s great Cornish stories following Hungry Hill, French-man’s Creek and Rebecca. Here we have the same excitement and suspense set at Menabilly on the Cornish Coast in turmoil the 17th Century.

Early Daphne du Maurier in its jacket

$40.00

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The Works of Andrew Marvell. Poetical, Controversial and Political, containing many Original Letters, Poems, and Tracts, never Before Printed. With a New Life of the Author, by Capt. Edward Thompson. 3 Quarto Volumes 1776

Three Volumes, large quarto, 648, 583 and 559 pages after preliminaries. Printed by Henry Baldwin for the Editor Captain Thompson. Bound in full leather with decorated spines. Some loss of leather but still an attractive antiquarian binding. Marbled endpapers, generally clean internally. A nice set of a scarce and valuable work. Substantial weighing in at 5.4 kgs. Carries the bookplates of Reg Ellery and Arthur Kay.

Reginald Spencer Ellery (1897-1955) was a distinguished Melbourne based psychiatrist and writer. He opened the first private psychiatric facility in Victoria, was communist sympathiser and influenced Sidney Nolan by providing him with drawing made by his patients. He is described as having been rather Bohemian and more a fit with Oxford than Melbourne. He had a great love of poetry, so this set of Marvel’s Works would have been very precious to him.

The Editor Captain Edward Thompson (1738-1786) rose the rank of Commodore. Well known as a literary figure and was known as “Poet Thompson’ in the navy. He also wrote sea songs including “Loose every sail to the Breeze” and “The Topsail shivers in the Wind”’ … which it does.

List of subscribers totalling circa 170 with many dignitaries (Duke [Brother of King George III] and Duchess of Cumberland and Duke and Duchess Northumberland), David Garrick (of the Theatre), Voyager hero The Hon Admiral Byron (of the Wager and Grandfather of the Poet); various members of the distinguished Luttrell Family … Temple Luttrell as MP supporting the American cause in the War of Independence and unusually General Charles Lee who at the time of publication was waging war against the British in America and about to be captured and imprisoned. And many more … the nature of which says a lot about the writing of Andrew Marvell.

An earlier volume of Marvell’s Works was published in 1726 edited by Cooke. They were deficient of the Prose Works and Many Letters and Pamphlets included here, including the Life of Marvel by Thompson. Complete, elegantly printed with broad margins.

Andrew Marvell (1621-1678) is described as being a metaphysical poet, satirist and politician. He was great friend of John Milton. Yorkshire born he went to Hull Grammar and at 13 went to Trinity College, Cambridge … his portrait by Kneller is in the College collection. He then travelled on the Continent … according to Milton, Marvel mastered French, Italian and Spanish. On return he became tutor to the daughter of Lord General Thomas Fairfax. During this period, he wrote perhaps his most famous poem “To His Coy Mistress”. During the Anglo Dutch War of 1652, he wrote several satirical poems attacking the Dutch character. In 1653 he moved into the realm of Cromwell, wrote several poems in praise of Cromwell, and worked with a took over from Milton (who was going blind) as expert all things Latin.

A taste of “To His Coy Mistress” …

Had we but world enough, and time,
This Coyness, Lady, were no crime
We would sit down and think which way
To walk and pass out long love’s day.
Thou by the Indian Ganges’ side
Shouldst rubies find: I by the tide
Of Humber would complain. I would
Love you ten years before the Flood,
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till the conversion of the Jews.

Much quoted … a later line “deserts of vast eternity” is used by Woolf in Orlando. Hemingway in a Farewell to Arms quotes “But at my back I always hear – Time’s winged chariot hurrying near” … and even Stephen King makes reference in Pet Sematary.

Marvellous Marvell Complete and in Good Form

$790.00

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Across the River and Into the Trees – Ernest Hemingway.

Published in London by Jonathan cape a 1971 edition. Octavo, 254 pages. Dust jacket complete but with chips and closed tear. Still a good to better copy of a collectable Hemingway in the preferred wrap around Cape dust jacket designed by Hans Tisdall.

His first novel since “For Whom the Bell Tolls”. Based in post war Venice full of character and description and the tragic that is in Hemingway.

Hemingway at his best.

$40.00

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The First 49 Stories – Ernest Hemingway

Published by Jonathan Cape a 1968 edition. Octavo, 414 pages a little fading of the lemon cover near and at the spine. Internally very clean … still a good to very good copy. Protected in Brodart.

The best introduction to Hemingway. Many favourites including “the short happy life of Francis Macomber”.

The Way into Hemingway

$40.00

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Cocktail Time – P.G. Wodehouse – First Edition Collectable

First Edition published by Herbert Jenkins, London in 1958.

Octavo, 222 very funny pages all in very good clean condition. Great period dust jacket.

a sought-after Wodehouse. Frederick, Fifth Earl of Ickenham has a lot of things on his plate but he gets them (everybody) sorted with hilarity.

Collectable Wodehouse – First Edition

$80.00

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Our Man in Havana – Graham Greene

The King’s General – Daphne du Maurier – 1947

The Works of Andrew Marvell. Poetical, Controversial and Political, containing many Original Letters, Poems, and Tracts, never Before Printed. With a New Life of the Author, by Capt. Edward Thompson. 3 Quarto Volumes 1776

Across the River and Into the Trees – Ernest Hemingway.

The First 49 Stories – Ernest Hemingway

Cocktail Time – P.G. Wodehouse – First Edition Collectable

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