"FAR AND AWAY HIS MOST ACCOMPLISHED PIECE OF FICTION TO DATE": FIRST EDITION OF H.G. WELLS’ KIPPS, INSCRIBED BY WELLS TO HIS FRIEND AND SCIENTIFIC CONSULTANT SIR RICHARD GREGORY

WELLS, H.G. Kipps: The Story of a Simple Soul. London: Macmillan, 1905. Octavo, original green blind-stamped cloth.

First edition, first issue, of this novel containing "much autobiographical material," inscribed by Wells on the half title, "To R.A. Gregory respectfully from H.G." Presented to and from the collection of Wells’ close friend and frequent scientific adviser, Sir Richard Arman Gregory.

"Sudden wealth precipitates Kipps into a new world that is more accommodating than the drapery but no more ready to let him be himself… Much autobiographical material lurks in the novel, not least the struggle to construct an identity to fit a changing social position and the personal tensions that threaten the protagonist's marriage. Able to draw on first-hand knowledge, Wells had produced a novel which was confident in its pace and sense of direction, lively, observant and supported by an almost unbroken flow of comic invention. It was far and away his most accomplished piece of fiction to date" (Sherborne, 166-67). "This novel was first printed serially in The Pall Mall Magazine (in 1905). Since its publication it has been adapted both for the stage and as a film" (Wells). First issue, with inserted publisher's catalogue dated "16/8/'05." Hammond A3. Wells 26. Inscribed to noted British scientist and Wells' lifelong friend Sir Richard Arman Gregory. In Wells' first work of fiction, he dedicated the work to Gregory as his "dearest friend." The two met while students at the Normal School of Science in South Kensington. They jointly authored a textbook, Honours Physiography, in 1891. Reportedly, Gregory was the one person with whom Wells never quarreled. A professor of astronomy, Gregory also possessed expertise in physics, chemistry and other disciplines; he wrote several textbooks and eventually assumed the editorship of the journal Nature, to which Wells frequently contributed. The author often turned to Gregory, and to the experts Gregory contacted on Wells' behalf, for insight and encouragement when writing his famous "scientific romances." After Wells' death, Gregory worked to establish the H.G. Wells Memorial to preserve public attention to his friend's body of work. Throughout his life Gregory was a passionate advocate for science—"It is necessary to believe in the holiness of scientific work," he once declared—and "an optimist about man's future" (Horrabin, in New Scientist, April 11, 1957).

Minor foxing to endpapers and edges; cloth clean and fresh, gilt bright. A near-fine and desirable presentation-association copy.