The Well at the World’s End.
London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1896. First trade edition. First Trade Edition (i.e. not the Kelmscott edition). “[O]ne of the most complex and beautiful fantasy quests ever written.” Mathews, Fantasy, the Liberation of Imagination (2002, pg. 44). “A romance of old England, recount[ing] the travels of Ralph and his three brothers, sons of the modest King Peter. An exercise in the manner of Malory.” Wildman, Edward Burne-Jones: Victorian Artist Dreamer (1998, pg. 307). The work was clearly an influence on Tolkien, with Tolkien even borrowing names from Well’s characters with “the name Gandolf for a character and Silverfax for a horse (compare Shadowfax, Gandalf’s horse in LOTR)” Kuusela, In Search of a National Epic: The Use of Old Norse Myths in Tolkien’s vision of Middle-Earth, Approaching Religion (2014, pg. 32). 8vo. 2 vols. vii, 378pp., [1]; vi, 279pp., [1]. Scott, pg. 16. Peterson A39 (noting the text of the Kelmscott edition “was set from the sheets of the Longmans edition, printed at the Chiswick Press, which was simultaneously in production.”). Very good in publisher’s linen-backed boards, with some spotting and loss to paper spine labels, contents clean, with bookplate of a prominent Morris collector to pastedown. Item #292
Price: $325.00