From The BiblioFile, Rapid River, MI, U.S.A.
AbeBooks Seller Since 30 November 2006
Seller Rating
About this Item
No date; circa 1935. Oversize 8" x 10" design. Rare deep red full-cloth boards, gilt impressed cover titles and design, sharp gilt spine titles, light shelf wear. Thick deckled pages very good, clean. Deep chiaroscuro skeletal designs at front and back endpapers; small number written at front endp. Frontispiece colour plate: "It Grew Louder -Louder - Louder! And Still the Man The Men Chatted Pleasantly, And Smiled". Deep red top-stain. Bind fine, square; hinges intact. Rare, original wrap-around dust wrapper in red, black and shadowy charcoal hues, moderate edge wear, adhesive, discoloration; clipped, protected in new clear sleeve. Wrapper depicts several dramatic macabre ghouls and imagery at front panel, spine and wrapping to back with deathly skeletals. Profusely illustrated with the ethereal, spine-tingling imagery of Arthur Rackham. Includes a dozen beautifully designed colour plates, each with captioned guard, and seventeen smooth-coated, chiaroscuro-like, full-page illustrations. Each rich in detail and depth. Additional partial-page imagery, vignettes, and decoration by Rackham throughout. Near fine, rare Lippincott edition in very good wrapper. Tales of Mystery and Imagination matched Edgar Allan Poe's best tales of horror and suspense with the expressive artwork of the inimitable Arthur Rackham. Beautifully designed volume w/colour illustrations giving substance to the terrifying imagery in Poe's masterpieces of the macabre. Rackham's art perfectly captures the perversity, madness, and delight in horror that were the hallmarks of Poe's dark genius. Rackham noted that whilst working on these illustrations, that they "were so horrible I was beginning to frighten myself." The plates are indicative of a grandeur and vision one might not so far have perceived in Rackham. The tales in order include: The Imp of the Perverse; The Tell-Tale Heart; A Descent into the Maelstrom; The Cask of Amontillado; The Premature Burial; Hop-Frog; The Assignation; King Pest; The Pit and the Pendulum; The Masque of Red Death; The Man of the Crowd; The Fall of the House of Usher; The Oval Portrait; The Gold Bug; Ligeia; Eleonora; Berenice; Morella; Ms. Found In a Bottle; William Wilson; The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar; Metzengerstein; The Murders in the Rue Morgue; The Mystery of Marie Roget; and, The Purloined Letter. Printed in Great Britain. 318 pages. Insured post. Size: 4to - over 9¾" - 12" tall. Seller Inventory # 019460
Bibliographic Details
Title: Poe's Tales of Mystery & Imagination ...
Publisher: J. B. Lippincott Co., Philadelphia
Publication Date: 1935
Binding: Hard Cover
Illustrator: Rackham, Arthur
Condition: Fine
Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good
Edition: First Edition.
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