"IN SANTA CROCE WITH NO BAEDEKER": A ROOM WITH A VIEW

FORSTER, E.M. A Room with a View. London: Edward Arnold, 1908. Octavo, recent full red morocco gilt, raised bands, marbled endpapers, all edges gilt. $4800.

First edition, first issue, one of only 2000 copies printed, handsomely bound by the Chelsea Bindery.

Forster's novel, "played against a sharply and intimately observed background of tennis and tea parties and amateur piano recitals," traces Lucy Honeychurch's passion for the unconventional and impulsive George Emerson as it develops within the confines of conventional British society. "Forster satirizes the English abroad, criticizes the sterility, snobbery, and 'witty weariness' of the self-consciously cultured, and describes Italy itself as a liberating vision" (Drabble, 845). Basis for the Academy Award-winning 1985 film starring Helena Bonham Carter and Julian Sands. With half title and with publisher's advertisements at the back. Kirkpatrick A3a.

A fine copy.