LITERATURE

With Thomas Carlyle recognised by the Victorians as one of their two greatest historians. See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 1p, 12mo. On grey wove watermarked paper. In good condition, lightly creased and aged. Folded twice. Reads ‘Dear Miss Richardson, / I am extremely sorry that I have an engagement which will make it impossible for me to have the pleasure of dining with you on Wednesday fortnight / Very truly yours, / T B Macaulay’.

See her entry, and that of Whittaker, in the Oxford DNB. 1p, landscape 12mo. A corner of the letter carrying a few words of text has been torn away on opening; it is still attached, beneath a red wax seal, so that the entire document is present in two parts. Otherwise in fair condition, lightly aged and worn. Addressed by Mitford 'To / Messrs. Baynes & Son / 23 Paternoster Row'. Begins: 'Miss Mitford presents her Compts. to Mr.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. Ingram's biography of Poe was responsible for his reabilitation, and his extensive collection of material relating to the writer is now in the University of Virginia. Entire small envelope (roughly 12 x 7 cm), self-printed with stamp. In good condition, lightly aged, with flap at back torn in opening of letter. With postmarks at front and back of the envelope, both dated 9 January 1875; front postmark from Malvern and back one from West Malvern. Addressed by Swinburne to ‘John H. Ingram Esq.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 1p, 4to. In good condition, lightly aged. Folded twice for postage. Reads: ‘Dear Mr Scarr: / I’m sorry but I have already engaged myself for three talks besides my offical three and, not being an extemporizer, can’t undertake any more. / Yours sincerely / Robert Graves’. See Image.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. The two items were previously held together by a small dab of glue at the head of the letter. They are now separated, and traces of the glue remain, not affecting any text. Otherwise they are in good condition, lightly aged. ONE: ALS, 30 December 1932. 1p, 12mo. Signed Hugh Walpole. He thanks him for his charming ‘Carol’: ‘I have been picking it out on the piano. And I send back the photo autographed. With every good wish for 1933’.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. Both items are somewhat sunned, but in good overall condition. ONE: ALS. 1p, 4to. Folded three times for postage. Signed ‘John Masefield’.

An excellent letter, casting light on one of the milestones of the English poetic canon. See his entry, and hers, in the Oxford DNB. ‘The Golden Treasury of the Best Songs and Lyrical Poems in the English Language’ appeared in 1861, and it remains, as J. W. Mackail wrote in the original DNB, 'one of those rare instances in which a critical work has substantive imaginative value, and entitles its author to rank among creative artists'.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. The three items are in good condition, each with his firm signature ‘Compton Mackenzie’. Each is 1p, 4to, in good condition, folded for postage.Despite being scored through, one can see that the first and last salutation are addressed to ‘Mrs Raymont’, and the second to ‘Mr Raymond’. ONE: 23 November 1961. He is pleased that she enjoyed his book ‘Mezzotint’: ‘The setting is really the Seychelles but of course I had to lay it in the South Atlantic instead of the Indian Ocean.’ He agrees with her ‘about these efforts at modernity by some of my contemporaries.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. The recipient is presumably the lyricist Peter Claremont Parsons. Plain postcard, apart from letterhead. In good condition, lightly aged. Image on request.Postmarked (from Paddington), stamped and addressed to ‘Geoffrey Parsons esq. / 22 Westbourne Park Road / W.2’. Small signature: ‘C. D. L.’ Reads: ‘Many thanks for Peter’s Progress. [Parson’s poetry book, published that year by Hand & Flower] I’ve read it with great pleasure & amusement, & fallen foul of little except ‘legacies’ rhyming with exegesis. My memory of those H. & S.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. Lightly aged and worn. With central horizontal and vertical crease for postage, each quarter with double pinholes at the centre (from attachment of an enclosure?). Signature unaffected (it starts close to vertical crease). Reads: 'Dear Mrs. Lord / With the greatest pleasure - and with ten thousand apologies. I thought I had answered long ago. But letters lie in heaps in my tray & on my table - everywhere! and I carry them about in bags labelled carefully Unanswered until I dare no longer look inside.

Reade was a fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford, from 1836 to his death. According to his entry in the Oxford DNB: ‘in the years of his fame, and particularly in the early 1860s, he did much of his writing in his rooms at Magdalen, using them as a retreat. His tenure of the fellowship was contingent on his remaining unmarried, a stipulation he complained of bitterly but continued to put up with, even when he was earning thousands a year as a writer’. 1p, 12mo. In fair condition, lightly discoloured, on thin wove paper. Folded once.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. Lightly aged and worn. With central horizontal and vertical crease for postage, each quarter with double pinholes at the centre (from attachment of an enclosure?). Signature unaffected (it starts close to vertical crease). Reads: 'Dear Mrs. Lord / With the greatest pleasure - and with ten thousand apologies. I thought I had answered long ago. But letters lie in heaps in my tray & on my table - everywhere! and I carry them about in bags labelled carefully Unanswered until I dare no longer look inside.

Of his activities around this time the Oxford DNB writes: 'he 'wrote film scripts in Hollywood in 1934–5 for classics such as David Copperfield (MGM, 1935), in which he played a bit part, and Little Lord Fauntleroy (1936)'. The subject of the letter may be his novel 'The Inquisitor', published by Macmillan in 1935. 1p, 12mo. In fair condition, lightly aged and worn. Folded once. Reads: ‘Dear Mr. Hunt / Here is a proof. The quotations are from the [?] Version. to me the only [last word underlined] version. / Yours sincerely / Hugh Walpole’.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 1p, 12mo. In good condition, lightly aged. Folded for postage. Reads: ‘Dear Miss Jennings / Thank you for your letter. There was however no half crown in the envelope. I searched carefully. / Yours sincerely / Hugh Walpole’.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. On 6 x 3.5 cm slip of paper, cut from letter. Reads ‘Yours very truly, / David Masson.’ Laid down on piece of 16mo paper, beneath oval photographic portrait of Masson cut from magazine. Biographical details typed at head of page. In good condition, lightly aged. Seee Image

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 4pp, 12mo. Bifolium. In fair condition, with slight wear at top left-hand corner of second leaf (not affecting text). Biographical details added in small type at head of first page. Addressed to ‘The Honbl Spencer Ponsonby’ and signed ‘Alaric A. Watts.’ Begins: ‘Dear Sir / May I trespass so far upon your kindness as to ask you to place the enclosed letter [not present] to Lord Clarendon. It is on the subject of the London Library of which his Lordship is the President’.

An apparent forgery of a letter the text of which is quoted in Hallam Tennyson’s 1897 memoir of his father. 1p, 12mo. On discoloured wove paper. Aged, and with repair with archival tape at extremities on reverse. Folded twice for postage. Reads: ‘Aldworth / Oct 25 - 76 / My dear Mrs Gladstone / On Monday then - if all be well. As you are good enough to say that you will manage everything rather than lose my visit - you must manage that I may have my pipe in my own room whenever I like? / Yours ever / A Tennyson/’.

An interesting item occupying the zone in which French connoisseurship and literature overlap. In 1880 - three years before the present item - Maurice Mauris (Marchese di Calenzano) described a visit to Dumas fils’s Paris house in Rue de Villers. ‘The walls above the library are enriched with a priceless collection of paintings, modern and antique. Diaz, Fortuny, Marchal, Vernet, Delacroix are there seen at their best. Dumas generally presents himself with a new painting after he has presented a new book to the public.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. On 10 x 7 cm piece of paper, cut down from letterhead. In good condition, lightly aged, with pin holes at top left. Clearly sent in response to a request for an autograph. Reads: 'Yours very truly / W. W. Jacobs'. See scan

On 14 x 9 cm plain printed postcard, addressed (by the recipient) to ‘Norman Wetton / 7 Claremont Road / Forest Gate / Essex’. On the plain side of the card she writes: ‘With pleasure here is the sign-manual of your’s [sic] faithfully / John Strange Winter. / (Henrietta. E. V. Stannard.) / Aug 24. 1905 -’.

The three items in good condition, lightly aged. Each folded. ONE: Lithographed copperplate funeral announcement. 1p, 4to. Black bordered. At foot: ‘Administration spéciale des Funerailles, 70, rue des Saints Pères, Henri de Borniol, Directeur.’ Headed ‘M’. Begins: ‘Vous êtes prié d’assister aux Convoi, Service et Enterrement, de Monsieur Charles-Rene-Forbes Conte de Montalembert, ancien Pair de France, Membre de l’Académie Française, décédé le 13 Mars 1870, muni des Sacraments de l’Eglise, en sa demeure, rue du Bac, No.

Letter One: [No envelope; undated] One page, 8vo, good condition. Text: Forgive me for not having written before to thank you for your very kind letter, but I have had something like five hundred letters & telegrams of congratulation & they have been a job to deal with. It was very kind of you to write. I am just off to England to receive the insignia. [Maugham was made a Companion of Honour in 1954 if that indicates the date of the letter(?)]; Letter Two: Postmark 24 Oct. 1934 and dated Oct. 34 (though the '3' looks like a '2'), Two pages, 8vo, good condition.

One page, 12mo, fold mark, good condition. Text in Lowell's hand: 22 April, 1882 | Faithfully yours | J.R. Lowell. Docketed with pencilled note at base with biographical details. See Image.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. Both items are in good condition, and each folded once. The second carries the merest trace of grey paper from a mount at one corner. ONE: To E. B. Nicholson, 3 November 1881. 2pp, 12mo. On first leaf of bifolium. Nicholson’s letter has been forwarded to him ‘here in my country house, where I am for a few days’. It is out of his power ‘to promise any assistance to your proposed Magazine.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. Both items are in good condition, and each folded once. The second carries the merest trace of grey paper from a mount at one corner. ONE: To E. B. Nicholson, 3 November 1881. 2pp, 12mo. On first leaf of bifolium. Nicholson’s letter has been forwarded to him ‘here in my country house, where I am for a few days’. It is out of his power ‘to promise any assistance to your proposed Magazine.

See her entry in the Oxford DNB. On 12.5 x 3 cm slip of paper cut from letter. Aged and worn, with nick lost from left side, and remains of mount on reverse. Reads: ‘I remain / Yours very truly & affectionately / Sarah Trimmer’. See Image.

Two pages,12mo, bifolium, good condition. Embossed heading Perseverantia et Fortitudo. My dear Kenney | In acknowledgment of Mrs Kenney's note Wednesday that between two and four [each] day except Saturdays & Mondays I am to be found here Wednesday I have most leisure & shall be happy to see you here tomorrow between 2 & 4 o'clock if convenient to you [...].

Four pages,16mo, bifolium, good condition. Dear Mr Ireland, | I will gladly be the means of transmitting your handsome volume [see Note b.] to the London Library. | I thank you for enabling me thus, even before my return, to glance over its pages. Such are my engagements here - that for the present I can do little more; but it has shown me for how much more I shall be indebted to you than I at first supposed.

See his entry in the Encylopedia of New Zealand, and those of Muggeridge and Kingsmill in the Oxford DNB. Each item 1p, foolscap 8vo. Both addressed to ‘Dear Mr Muggeridge’. ONE (12 September 1955): In good condition, on air mail paper, lightly aged and creased. Signed in pencil with calligraphic squiggle. Begins: ‘I want to write something about Hugh Kingsmill. About 20 years ago we exchanged a few letters during a flare up in the Wilde-Douglas business at a time when Robert Sherard was busy fanning the flames and G. B. S.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. The first letter, and probably the second, were written around the time when his ‘Down the Garden Path’ (1932) and its two sequels had made Nichols wildly popular, eliciting several parodies. ONE (TLS to ‘Mr. Bryon’): 1p, 12mo. Discoloration along top part of outer edge, otherwise in good condition. Folded once. Good clear signature ‘Beverley Nichols’. He thanks him for sending the interview. ‘I think it is admirably written, and expresses my views very clearly.’ TWO (conclusion of TLS): 1p, 12mo. Twenty-nine lines of text. In good condition, lightly aged.