FIRST EDITION OF IDYLLS OF THE KING, 1859, HANDSOMELY BOUND, THE JAMES W. ELLSWORTH COPY
TENNYSON, Alfred. Idylls of the King. London: Edward Moxon, 1859. 12mo, early 20th-century full crushed green morocco gilt, raised bands, marbled endpapers, top edge gilt.
First edition, second issue, of Tennyson's "long-meditated great task" (Baugh et al., 1388)—verse renditions of Arthurian legends that restored them to popularity and brought him to prominence—handsomely bound in full morocco-gilt by Zaehnsdorf. With the bookplate of Gilded Age industrialist James W. Ellsworth.
Although Tennyson was, from his youth, an avid admirer of stories about King Arthur and his knights, by the early 19th century "Arthurian legends had become a literary anachronism. Tennyson's poetry brought about a rebirth of interest in the material and eventually placed it on a new plateau of respect and significance for writers and artists… Tennyson's recreation of the Arthurian world is an attempt to reform his generation by showing the effects of sensuality, materialism and spiritual blindness" (Lacy, 446-49). "I intended Arthur," he would later explain, "to represent the Ideal Soul of Man coming into contact with the warring elements of the flesh." His message found a ready audience: these first four of what would eventually be a dozen connected poems "received a welcome so instantaneous as at once to restore [their] author to his lost place in the affections of many… Men so different as Macaulay, Dickens and Ruskin swelled the chorus of enthusiastic praise… From the publication of the first Idylls until the end of the poet's life, his fame and popularity continued without check" (DNB). Second issue, with publisher's imprint on verso of title page. Bound without publisher's advertisements. Original cloth bound in. Dodd, Mead, 35-37. CBEL IV:677. Lowndes, 2605. Armorial bookplate of James W. Ellsworth, prominent Gilded Age industrialist and banker. Ellsworth was a connoisseur of rare coins and art as well as books. Among other achievements, he "directed all his energies toward the successful development of the 'Dream City'" as a principal director of the celebrated 1893 World's Columbian Exposition (Chicago Public Library). His son was polar explorer Lincoln Ellsworth, who named some 350,000 square miles in western Antarctica in his father's honor.
Interior fine. Spine toned to brown with joints expertly repaired, light soiling and abrasions to rear board. A near-fine copy, handsomely bound, with distinguished provenance.