Literature - 25 - Bauman Rare Books “The Thing In The Coffin Writhed; And A Hideous, Blood-Curdling Screech Came From The Opened Red Lips”: First Edition Of Bram Stoker’s Dracula 21. STOKER, Bram. Dracula. Westminster, 1897. Octavo, 20thcentury full yellow morocco reproducing the original cloth. $15,000. First edition, very early issue, of Stoker’s masterpiece of horror, handsomely bound by Chelsea Bindery in full morocco to match the original cloth binding. Contemporary reviews compared Stoker’s masterpiece favorably to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights, and Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher. Since then it has engendered “arguably the most potent literary myth of the 20th century” (Leatherdale, 11). “Bram Stoker has given us the most remarkable scenes of horror… Dracula is a panting engine of late Victorian sexuality, a sexuality that has been barely sublimated into violence” (Stephen King). First edition printed on thicker paper, very early issue with advertisement for The Shoulder of Shasta on verso of integral leaf (i.e. 391/392); later issues found with multiple leaves of publisher’s advertisements bound in. With half title. Dalby 10a. Contemporary owner inscription above title page dated “Dec. 19th 1898.” Text bright and pristine, faint toning line to front board. A beautiful about-fine copy. “Listen to them, the children of the night. What music they make!”
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