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English Dramatists, The
London: John C. Nimmo, 1885. Item #06417
The English Dramatists on Large Paper
A Finely Bound Brian Frost Set of the Great Elizabethan and Jacobean Playwrights
ENGLISH DRAMATISTS. The English Dramatists Edited by A. H. Bullen. London: John C. Nimmo, 1885–1888.
Large-paper issue, one of only 120 numbered copies printed on laid paper.
Sixteen octavo volumes (8 3/4 x 5 1/2 inches; 222 x 140 mm.). Title-pages printed in red and black throughout, with etched portrait frontispiece of Thomas Middleton in the first volume.
Comprising: Thomas Middleton (1580-1627). 8 volumes. 1885; Christopher Marlowe (1564-1593). 3 volumes. 1885; John Marston (1576-1634). 3 volumes. 1887 and George Peele (1556-1596). 2 volumes. 1888.
Handsomely bound circa 1960 by Brian Frost in three-quarter green morocco over green cloth boards ruled in blind, spines with five raised bands decoratively tooled and lettered in gilt in compartments, marbled endpapers, top edges gilt. Spines a little faded, otherwise a fine and elegant set.
An important scholarly edition devoted to the principal non-Shakespearean dramatists of the Elizabethan and Jacobean stage. Under the editorship of A. H. Bullen - one of the foremost literary scholars of his generation - these volumes helped restore serious attention to the extraordinary richness and diversity of Renaissance English drama beyond Shakespeare himself.
The centerpiece of the collection is the extensive edition of Thomas Middleton, whose darkly satirical and psychologically acute plays have increasingly come to be regarded among the greatest achievements of the Jacobean theater. Included alongside Middleton are the complete dramatic works of Christopher Marlowe, Shakespeare’s brilliant predecessor whose Doctor Faustus, Tamburlaine, and Edward II transformed English tragedy; John Marston, master of fierce satire and decadent comedy; and George Peele, among the earliest and most lyrical dramatists of the Elizabethan stage.
Printed in a strictly limited large-paper issue of only 120 sets and attractively rebound by the noted Bath binder Brian Frost, the present set offers both scholarly importance and considerable shelf appeal - a distinguished collection of the great voices of the English Renaissance theater.
Price: $2,500.00