“PERHAPS THE MOST IMPORTANT LANDMARK IN DORÉ’S CAREER”: HIS GREAT BIBLE, WITH 194 FULL-PAGE WOOD-ENGRAVINGS, IN ORIGINAL FULL MOROCCO-GILT

(DORÉ, Gustave). The Holy Bible Containing the Old and New Testaments, According to the Authorised Version. With Illustrations by Gustave Doré. London, Paris, and Melbourne: Cassell and Company, circa 1892. Large quarto (9-1/2 by 12 inches), original full black morocco, elaborately blind- and gilt-decorated boards and spines, all edges gilt.

Later edition of Gustave Doré’s great illustrated Bible, splendidly illustrated by him with 194 full-page wood-engravings and beautifully bound in contemporary, elaborate morocco-gilt. A lovely copy.

"In the 1870s, The Doré Bible was perhaps the most treasured (and expensive) book in the world" (Malan, 81). Certainly, it proved a milestone in Doré's career. "Whereas he had to hawk round to publishers his drawings for the Rabelais [part of his intended series of volumes illustrating the masterpieces of literature], only to see them ruined by the cheap-jack who eventually took them on, the Bible was enthusiastically sponsored by one of the greatest French publishers of illustrated books of the day, Mame of Tours… Its original reception was truly remarkable… A second edition of the Bible was called for almost at once… Editions appeared in almost every European country… One of the first off the mark was an English edition from Cassell, Petter and Galpin, 1867. This caused an even greater sensation than the French edition, and the demand among collectors for any and everything by Doré was clamorous" (Muir, 224). With Apocrypha. This is a later edition of Doré's Holy Bible printed in a slightly more manageable quarto format rather than the earlier folio format (9-1/2 by 12 inches rather than 12 by 15 inches) first published in 1867. This edition also contains 194 large engraved plates rather than the 238 or 205 plates found in earlier editions. Malan, 239. Herbert 1977. Four Family Register pages with wood-engraved borders precede Genesis; here, they have been partially completed with numerous 20th-century entries.

Plates crisp and lovely, light wear to endpapers, light foxing and soiling to preliminary and concluding leaves, only slight rubbing to binding. A handsome, very nearly fine copy.