1880 Rare Victorian Edition - Goethe's Faust in two parts, Illustrated

Author: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Translated by Anna Swanwick.
Title: Goethe’s Faust: In Two Parts. (Complete in one volume).
Publisher: Chicago: Belford, Clarke & Co., circa 1880s.
Language: Text in English.
Size: 7.5" × 5".
Pages: 424 pages.
Binding: Attractive and very good publisher’s striking original blue cloth binding, richly decorated in black and gilt with a floral Art-Nouveau-style design on the front cover and spine, incorporating vases, leaves, and ornamental borders (hinges fine, overall slightly worn and scuffed - as shown, slight rubbing and minor marks to rear board - as shown) under a protective removable mylar cover. All edges gilt. Overall, a bright, well-preserved example.
Content: Very good content (bright, tight and clean, rare light toning - as shown). Original patterned endpapers printed in warm sepia tones.
Illustrations: Illustrated with fine engraved frontispiece portrait of Goethe and four full-page steel engravings depicting key scenes, including Mephistopheles and Faust, and Gretchen at her window. (Complete).

Estimate: (USD 225–250).

The book: A splendid late 19th-century American edition of Goethe’s Faust, attractively bound and beautifully illustrated, translated by Anna Swanwick—one of the earliest and most respected English translators of the German classics. The volume includes both parts of Goethe’s monumental work: the tragedy of human striving and damnation that defined Romantic literature.

This Belford, Clarke & Co. edition captures the Victorian fascination with moral drama and the supernatural, enhanced by elegant typography, red rule borders, and richly executed engravings. Its ornate decorative binding, featuring intertwined botanical motifs and golden accents, epitomizes the exuberant aesthetic of 1880s gift-book design.

The author: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) was a towering figure of German literature—poet, dramatist, scientist, and philosopher. His Faust, first published in 1808 and completed in 1832, stands as one of the greatest achievements in world literature: a poetic drama exploring ambition, love, temptation, and redemption, inspired by medieval legend but infused with modern humanism and metaphysical depth.

The translator: Anna Swanwick (1813–1899), a British scholar and philanthropist, was renowned for her elegant English versions of Aeschylus and Goethe. Her translation of Faust—praised for its fidelity and poetic grace—made the work accessible to Victorian readers and remains one of the classic 19th-century renderings of Goethe’s masterpiece.