“GRUMBLING HOMER’S GREEK UNDER HIS BREATH”: FIRST EDITION OF WILLIAM MORRIS’ ODYSSEY, IN A SUMPTUOUS BAYNTUN-RIVIERE BINDING

MORRIS, William. The Odyssey of Homer Done Into English Verse. London: Reeves & Turner, 1887. Two volumes. Small quarto, modern full navy morocco gilt, elaborately decorated front boards with white morocco onlays and Greek key borders, patterned endpapers, top edges gilt, uncut; housed in a custom slipcase. $9500.

First edition of Morris’ esteemed translation, in a stunning binding with front board portrait onlays by Bayntun-Riviere.

In the spring of 1886, Morris "took up a task, or rather to him a recreation, delightful in itself and the more pleasant by contrast with his political work, the translation of the Odyssey into English verse" (DNB). Morris' son-in-law vividly described Morris in his study working on this project: "He would be standing at an easel or sitting with a sketchbook in front of him, charcoal, brush or pencil in hand, and all the while would be grumbling Homer's Greek under his breath… He would prowl about the room, filling and lighting his pipe, halting to add a touch or two at one or other easel, still grumbling, go to his writing-table, snatch up his pen and write furiously for a while—20, 50 and 100 or more lines… The speed of his hand would gradually slacken, his eye would wander to an easel, a sketch-block, or to some one of the manuscripts in progress, and that would have its turn. There was something well-nigh terrifying to a youthful onlooker in the deliberate ease with which he interchanged so many forms of creative work, taking up each one exactly at the point at which he had laid it aside and never halting to recapture the thread of his thought…" (Thompson, 700). CBEL III:314. OCEL I:510. See Grolier, Morris 73.

Fine condition.