IN FAIRYLAND. A Series of Pictures from the Elf-World. - Doyle, Richard

First edition, 1870, Folio. Green cloth with gilt lettering and decoration to cover and spine. All edges gilt. Frontispiece and fifteen wood-engraved plates printed in colour by Edmund Evans, many plates incorporating three or four smaller images. Numerous black and white vignettes. A bright copy of this classic work. Some edgewear to the boards and a new, sympathetically decorated spine. Some thumbing and light foxing, mostly to the page edges. Previous owner's inscription to the ffep.

"Doyle's most sought after work is the folio, In Fairyland.., a masterpiece of book-illustration and an outstanding example of the colour printing of the equally well-known Edmund Evans (1826-1905), a craftsman whose work for Walter Crane, Randolph Caldecott, Kate Greenaway and other writers and illustrators, put him at the top of his profession. In Fairyland, the text supplied by a poem by William Allingham (1824-1829), is one of the finest books ever produced for children, and from the collector's point of view, a most desirable item to add to any library of juvenile works..." (Eric Quale - Collector's Book of Children's Books)

2000 copies were printed by Longmans, but the high price of 31s 6d meant that it was too expensive for the average buyer. Longmans Archive indicates that few copies were sold, resulting in the remaining copies being reissued in 1875 with a new title page.

A number of the extant copies would have suffered the practise of being cut-up for their plates, making complete copies if this first edition increasingly hard to find. 

Publisher: Longmans, Green, Reader, & Dyer
Date Published: 1870
Publication Place: London
First Edition: Yes

Condition: Very good
Binding: Hardcover

Dimensions: 38.5 x 28cm