Sims Reed Rare Books×

Silverpoints

Gray, John

London. Elkin Mathews and John Lane at the Sign of the Bodley Head in Vigo Street. 1893
The de luxe edition of John Gray's decadent 'Silverpoints' bound in full vellum.

From the edition limited to 275 copies, with this one of 25 from the édition de tête on laid paper with the watermark 'SPALDING' and bound in full vellum; the ordinary edition was bound in green cloth with matching decoration.

John Gray's first book and one of the most influential works of the Aesthetic Movement.
Gray was a protege of Oscar Wilde - the poem 'Summer Past' is dedicated to Wilde - who is believed to have paid the publishing costs of the book. Gray dedicates his poems to, among others, Verlaine, Charles Shannon, Jules Laforgue, Ellen Terry and Pierre Louÿs and includes imitations of Verlaine, Arthur RImbaud, Stéphane Mallarmé and Baudelaire.
[22 leaves; pp. xxxviii, (i)]. Tall 12mo. (218 x 112 mm). Printed title, leaf with copyright recto, quotation from Verlaine verso and 28 poems by Gray, leaf with printer's credit and discreet vignette; decorative 6-line initials by Ricketts to the opening of two poems. Full vellum designed by Charles Ricketts, front and rear boards ruled in gilt to surround a mosaic field of gilt foliate tools on a gilt curvilinear background, discreet titles in gilt at upper right.
#47359

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