Oscar Wilde First Editions

Number 773 of 800 copies; tall 8vo (260 x 155 mm.); title with vignette printed in red; original near-white cloth gilt, designed by Ricketts, top edge gilt, others uncut, an excellently bright & sharp copy.

First collected edition; 14 volumes, 8vo; one of 80 sets printed on Japanese papier velin; publisher's cream vellum, gilt decorative devices to front panels by Charles Ricketts, yapp edges, top edges gilt, 13 volumes have the imprint of Methuen & Co., and one, The Picture of Dorian Gray, has the imprint of Charles Carrington, Paris (as called for), usual mild wrinkling to most paste-downs, covers mildly toned, some volumes with minor glue reaction (both points usual with vellum bindings), otherwise exceptionally fine internally and externally. Height: 21 cm Overall width of set: 50 cm

[Together with], For Love of the King: A Burmese Masque. Methuen issued this work in 1922, intending it to be a supplementary volume to the above set but never issued in vellum; printed on hand-made paper and limited to 1000 copies only; publisher's cream cloth, browning to spine and edges, dust-jacket with some expert archival repairs to the interior of the folds, Ex-libris Frederick Spiegelberg (name plate on front paste-down) as well as Gertrude & Edward A. Strauss (bookplate on front paste-down), previous bookseller's label on rear paste-down, a very good copy.