The Chapbook. [Numbers 1-40, all published].

A rare complete set of the longest-running literary "little magazine" of the 1920s, including ten copies from the library of a contributor, H. H. Abbott. Through poetry and essays, The Chapbook provided "a critical survey of contemporary literature, and numerous examples of the creative work of the present period" (Number 1). Its collection of both Georgian and modernist poets reveals a changing literary landscape. The editor, Harold Monro (1879-1932), was a key player in the publication of poetry in early 20th-century Britain. His Poetry Bookshop in Bloomsbury was a hub of literary activity and published famous anthologies such as the Georgian Poetry series and Ezra Pound's Des Imagistes (1914). The Chapbook follows in the tradition of "little magazines", which flourished in the early 20th century by offering editorial visions marked by originality and independence. "The mere size of The Chapbook and the diversity of its range disqualified it from competing with papers like The Athenaeum or The London Mercury. The paper was a rather light-weight production, presenting new verse, new verse-drama or criticism, in convenient, bite-size portions. The casualness and freedom that resulted was one of The Chapbook's attractive qualities" (Grant, p. 138). Number 34 of February 1923 followed the publication of The Waste Land (1922). "The poetry of the future had at last arrived, and [Monro] was one of the first poets to recognize it" (Hibberd, p. 224), publishing his essay on the poem in the form of an imaginary discussion between himself and his friend T. S. Eliot. The Chapbook also covered international developments. F. S. Flint discussed the Dada movement in The Younger French Poets (Number 17, November 1920), and John Gould Fletcher wrote the issue Some Contemporary American Poets (Number 11, May 1920). In praising figures such as Robert Frost, Fletcher's issue gave "the first competent account of American poetry to appear in England for a very long time, [correcting] the illusion of the English reader that Vachel Lindsay was the only serious modern American poet" (Grant, p. 156). The headmaster H. H. Abbott (1891-1976), who contributes eight poems to Number 7 (1920), has pencilled his name and address of 90 Park Grove on the wrappers of ten later numbers. Monro launched Abbott's brief career as a poet of the Essex countryside and reprinted his contributions to The Chapbook in a separately published collection, Black & White (1922). The first two portfolio cases have the ownership inscription of the liberal MP Cecil Harmsworth, first baron Harmsworth (1869-1948), younger brother to the press lords Northcliffe and Rothermere and the former owner of the home of Samuel Johnson. The other contributors included Herbert Read, Walter de la Mare, Siegfried Sassoon, Edith Sitwell, D. H. Lawrence, T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, and many more. The covers and occasional illustrations were attractively designed by artists such as Paul Nash, Wyndham Lewis, E. McKnight Kauffer, and Jean de Bosschère. The final issue of The Chapbook brought Monro's influential career as an editor to an end. Hoffman, Allen, & Ulrich, p. 256. Joy Grant, Harold Monro and the Poetry Bookshop, 1967; Dominic Hibberd, Harold Monro: Poet of the New Age, 2001. Together, 40 issues, octavo. Woodcuts and line drawings in the text. Numbers 1-12 and 13-24 bound in the publisher's two quarter cloth portfolio vols with marbled sides and paper labels, original wrappers bound in, Numbers 25-32 bound in wrappers housed in the publisher's portfolio chemise, Numbers 33-38 in wrappers, Numbers 39-40 in hardcover boards, Number 40 with dust jacket. Assortment of Poetry Bookshop ephemera loosely inserted. Slight wear and foxing externally, contents generally clean, wrappers of Number 25 neatly repaired. In well-preserved condition.