ONE OF ONLY 60 COPIES SIGNED BY AUTHOR WALTER DE LA MARE

DE LA MARE, Walter. The Lord Fish. London: Faber & Faber, [1933]. Octavo, original pictorial purple vellum gilt, yapp edges, pictorial endpapers, uncut, top edge gilt. $600.

Signed limited first edition of this classic collection of fairy tales, number 3 of 60 copies handsomely printed on English handmade paper and signed by Walter de la Mare, with illustrated title page and three illustrated plates by Rex Whistler, in publisher's beautiful vellum-gilt.

"One of modern literature's chief exemplars of the romantic imagination" (Poetry Foundation), Walter de la Mare wrote this collection of fairy stories, which reflect his long preoccupation with the fantastical mysteries of childhood. The work contains some of de la Mare's finest stories for children, including "The Lord Fish," "A Penny A Day," "The Jacket," "Dick and the Beanstalk," "Hodmadod," "The Old Lion," and "Sambo and the Snow Mountains." "During the course of his life de la Mare wrote about a hundred short stories for both children and adults: mysterious, often sinister, nearly always poetic in effect" (DNB). Rex Whistler has added to de la Mare's fantasy world by adding lovely in-text vignettes, an illustrated title page, and three illustrated plates depicting scenes from the stories. An award-winning illustrator from childhood, Whistler's career as was cut short when he was killed by a mortar bomb during the Normandy invasion. Without rare dust jacket.

Interior fine, slightest bowling to covers and a bit of toning to extremities, gilt quite bright. A lovely near-fine copy.