Holiday 2020 Catalogue

13 H o l i d a y 2 0 2 0 “The One Great Christmas Myth Of Modern Literature”: Dickens’ Five Illustrated Christmas Books (Four In First Edition) 10. DICKENS, Charles. The Christmas Books. London, 1843-48. Together, five volumes. Small octavo, early 20th-century full red morocco gilt. $12,000. First editions of all but one of Charles Dickens’ Christmas books, including a first edition, second issue of A Christmas Carol—the veritable “Bible of Christmas”—illustrated with 63 engravings altogether, four in color, by Leech, Maclise, Stanfield, Doyle and Landseer. A lovely set, beautifully bound by Sangorski & Sutcliffe. A Christmas Carol “may readily be called the Bible of Christmas… It was issued about ten days before Christmas, 1843, and6000copiesweresoldonthefirstday” (Eckel, 110). “Suddenly conceived and written within a few weeks, [ A Christmas Carol ] was the first of Dickens’ Christmas books (a new literary genre thus created incidentally)… it was an extraordinary achievement—the one great Christmas myth of modern literature” (Gimbel). Dickens followed its success with four more Christmas books. In each book, he deftly develops the themes of the first. This set of five volumes is comprised of four first editions andone fourthedition,with the followingpoints: AChristmas Carol is thefirst edition, second issue, dated 1843,with the title page in red andblue and corrected text (“StaveOne” onpage [1]);first editionof The Chimes , with the first state of the engraved title page (publisher’s imprint is engravedwithin the title vignette); fourth edition of The Cricket on theHearth ; first edition of The Battle of Life , with vignette title page in the fourth state (subtitled “ALove Story” on a scroll carried by an angel andwithout publisher’s imprint); first edition of The HauntedMan and the Ghost’s Bargain . All advertisements present, as issued. A Christmas Carol rebacked with original spine laid down. A fine set, beautifully bound. “I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.”