Beschreibung
Octavos, [2], vii-ix, [3], 345, [2] (Vol. 1); 315, [1] (Vol. 2); 223-299,[1] (Vol. 3); 3-308, [1] (Vol. 4); 3-324, [1] (Vol. 5); 3-320 (Vol. 6); 3-322 (Vol. 7); 3-346, [1] (Vol. 8). Good; bound in contemporary leather with burgundy and gilt spine titles, some areas of discoloration to covers, wear and slight tears to spine edges and corners, all volumes are in protective plastic covers; some boards slightly shaken, bindings else tight; text blocks age toned but clean; pages clean; half-title in Vol. 1 only; previous owner names in ink on ffeps "Jannett McCurdy's;" "AH Has [?]; J.C. Jennings;" long transcription of an extract from Chateaubriand in ink to front matter of Vol. 1 and dedication (see Notes). Shelved above WWI. Samuel Richardson (1689 - 1761) was an English writer and printer known for his epistolary novels. He printed almost 500 works, including journals and magazines, working periodically with the London bookseller Andrew Millar. Richardson had been apprenticed to a printer, whose daughter he eventually married. He lost her along with five sons, but remarried and had four daughters who reached adulthood, but had no male heirs to continue the print shop. As it ran down, he wrote his first novel at the age of 51 and joined the admired authors of his day. (via Wikipedia) Much like the Bertrams in Mansfield Park, Jane Austen and her siblings were fond of putting on "theatricals" at home for their friends and neighbors. In 1793, at the age of eighteen, Jane Austen began writing (and shortly afterwards abandoned) a dramatic adaptation of this work, entitled "Sir Charles Grandison or the happy Man, a comedy in 6 acts." She completed it in 1800. Extract copied into Volume 1: "Of all representations of madness, says dr. Joseph Warton, that of Clementina's is most deeply interesting. I know not whether even the madness of Lear is wrought up and expressed by so many little strokes of nature & passion - it is absolute pedantry to prefer and compare the madness of Orestes in Euripides to this of Clementina" Richardson has founded the excellence of his good characters entirely upon a Christian basis. He has exemplified the beautiful ideal of human nature -- the character of Clementina, Sir Charles Grandison, and Clarissa Harlowe are the most virtuous, amiable, accomplish'd and noble, that can well be imagined -- they are supported with strict propriety & elevated by uncommon dignity -- and charm the reader, while they command his admiration -- they show that mankind are truly happy only in proportion as they listen to the dictates of conscience and follow the path of duty --- where could Richardson, a bookseller and a printer, immersed in the occupation of his shop and his press, acquire such a correct acquaintance with high life, and refined society, such exalted sentiments of religion, honor, love, freindship, and philanthropy, as he has displayed in his works? -- Where did he acquire such a command over our feelings, such a power "to open the sacred source of sympathetic tears" The best answer to these questions is -- that he deriv'd those treasures from the rich resources of his own mind, from the study of the bible, and a quick insight into human nature & character. He has been justly styled "the great master of the human heart" -- "the Shakespeare of romance." -- Clarissa Harlowe -- & Sir Charles Grandison are long works, because they are designed to develop the springs of human action and give a distinct view of the progressive, various and complex movement of the human mind - Prolixity is made the pretext of the frivolous novel readers of the present age to neglect these invaluable works - alltho if they be weighed in the balance of literary justice, they will be found to comprise as much, if not more, sterling excellence, than half the novels that have been written since their publication." Transcribed from The Beauties of Christianity pp. 103-104 by Chateaubriand (tr. 1813, Frederic Shoberl) There is a dedication in t.
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