Description

CARROLL’S SNARK, EXTRAORDINARY PRESENTATION COPY, ONE OF ONLY 3 OR 4 KNOWN COPIES IN GREEN CLOTH

CARROLL, Lewis (DODGSON, Charles). The Hunting of the Snark. London: Macmillan, 1876. Octavo, original green cloth gilt, all edges gilt. 

First edition, presentation copy, one of only three or four copies in green cloth, inscribed on the half-title: “A.A. Vansittart, Esq. From the Author. Ap. 3. 1876.”

Originally intended for Sylvie and Bruno, Carroll’s continually expanding work on The Hunting of the Snark justified its separate publication in 1876. “The poem describes with infinite humor the impossible voyage of an improbable crew to find an inconceivable creature. It has been called the ‘Odyssey of the Nonsensical,’ ‘a masterpiece with more nonsense to the foot than could be found in an acre of lesser stuff’… The illustrations are noteworthy as a triumph of art over almost intractable material” (Williams & Madan 115). The illustrator Henry Holiday had actually made a picture of the Snark, but Carroll rejected it, saying “it was a beautiful beast, but he had made the Snark strictly unimaginable and desired him to remain so.”

This copy is one of only three or four copies known in publisher’s deluxe green cloth. Dodgson wrote to Macmillan on March 21, 1876 ordering “100 bound in red and gold, 20 in dark blue and gold, 20 in white vellum and gold.”In a letter dated Dec. 18, 1877 Dodgson also offered a friend light blue and light green, though there is no record of copies in these colors being bound by Macmillan. It is now fairly universally agreed that there were but ten copies each bound in the dark blue and the green cloths, as the number of verifiable copies for each does not exceed ten. Of the 100 red copies, we know of approximately 75% of the recipients; of the blue copies, we know of only five or six, and of the green copes only three or four. It is highly doubtful that any of the colored bindings were for sale. Dodgson asked Macmillan to advertise Snark “to be published on the 1st of April—Surely that is the fittest day for it to appear.” On Wednesday, March 29th, he went to London to write in “80 presentation copies” which were just ready; Dodgson recorded in his diary that this inscribed copy (to Vansittart) was sent to the recipient on April 3.The recipient, Augustus Arthur Vansittart (1824-1882), a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, in March 1872 translated “Jabberwocky” into Latin.

A beautiful, fine copy in a rare binding, with a wonderful presentation inscription.