1886 Scarce Hand-colored Edition - A Christmas Carol, A Ghost Story of Christmas
Author: Charles Dickens. Illustrated by John Leech.
Title: A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas.
Publisher: London: Chapman and Hall, Limited, 1886.
Language: Text in English.
Size: 6.5 x 4.5 inches.
Pages: 166 pages + 2 pages of publisher’s advertisements.
Binding: Attractive and very good, finely bound by Root & Son, London, in three-quarter dark brown morocco over marbled paper boards, with raised bands, gilt titles, and floral gilt tooling to compartments (hinges fine, overall slightly scuffed with light toning soiling to the marbled paper boards - as shown) under a protective removable mylar cover. All edges gilt. Bound for Charles E. Lauriat Co., Boston, a noted 19th-century American bookseller of fine bindings.
Content: Very good content (bright, tight and clean, rare light foxing and toning - as shown, original red silk page marker detached but preserved intact and laid in). A well-preserved and complete example of this rare colour illustrated reprint.
Illustrations: Illustrated with four hand-colored etched plates by John Leech (including the famous “Mr. Fezziwig’s Ball” frontispiece) and wood engravings in text by W. J. Linton after Leech.
Estimate: (USD 750 – 1000).
The book: A beautifully preserved scarce 1886 hand-colored illustrated edition of A Christmas Carol, Dickens’s immortal tale of redemption and compassion. This edition, reprinted from the stereotype plates of the original 1843 issue, preserves the celebrated John Leech illustrations, here finely hand-colored as in the earliest impressions.
The edition was printed by Chapman & Hall at a time when Dickens’s Christmas masterpiece had become both a literary and cultural institution. The result is a sumptuous revival of the Victorian classic, complete with all Leech plates, in a handsome Root & Son binding, one of London’s premier binderies of the period.
The author: Charles Dickens (1812–1870) was England’s greatest Victorian novelist and social commentator. With A Christmas Carol (1843), he redefined the spirit of Christmas through a moral and emotional lens, emphasizing charity, goodwill, and personal transformation. The story of Ebenezer Scrooge, Jacob Marley, and Tiny Tim became one of the most beloved narratives in English literature, embodying Dickens’s lifelong concern for the poor and his genius for storytelling.
The illustrator: John Leech (1817–1864) was one of the preeminent illustrators of the Victorian era, best known for his caricatures in Punch and his collaborations with Dickens. His hand-colored etchings for A Christmas Carol — especially “Mr. Fezziwig’s Ball”, “Marley’s Ghost”, and “The Ghost of Christmas Present” — are among the most iconic images in 19th-century book illustration, defining the visual identity of Dickens’s world.