1898 Rare First Edition - The Arabian Nights by Andrew Lang, Illustrated
The true 1898 First Edition of Andrew Lang’s beautifully illustrated Arabian Nights Entertainments, in its striking original gilt pictorial binding and profusely illustrated by Henry Justice Ford.
Author: Selected and edited by Andrew Lang. Illustrated by Henry Justice Ford.
Title: The Arabian Nights Entertainments.
Publisher: London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 39 Paternoster Row; New York and Bombay, 1898.
Edition: First Edition.
Language: English.
Pages: xvi, 424 pages.
Size: 7 x 5 inches.
Binding: Very good original publisher’s deep blue cloth binding, spectacularly decorated in gilt to the front board with a winged genie flying above a star-filled sky, crescent moon, minarets and domes. Gilt titles and a further gilt figure decorate the spine. Upper edge gilt. Binding firm and well preserved, with some light rubbing, marks and age-related wear, particularly to the spine and rear board, as shown. Protected in a removable mylar cover.
Content: Very good content, complete, tight and generally clean, with expected age toning and scattered light foxing and spotting. Early handwritten presentation inscription dated Christmas 1903 to the half-title, as shown.
Illustrations: Beautifully and profusely illustrated throughout by Henry Justice Ford with numerous full-page and in-text black-and-white illustrations, including the frontispiece The Talisman is Discovered in One of the Jars.
Estimate: $350–500 USD.
The book:
This handsome First Edition presents Andrew Lang’s selection from the Arabian Nights, bringing together such enduring tales as The Seven Voyages of Sindbad the Sailor, Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp, The Enchanted Horse, stories of genies, merchants, princes and princesses, and many other adventures drawn from the great tradition of the One Thousand and One Nights. The elaborate gilt binding is particularly evocative, its moonlit architectural scene and flying supernatural figure perfectly introducing the fantastic world within.
Published in 1898 by Longmans, Green, and Co., the volume belongs to the remarkable body of illustrated folklore and fairy literature associated with Andrew Lang at the end of the Victorian era. The combination of Lang’s accessible storytelling and Ford’s imaginative visual interpretation made these books enduring favourites with generations of readers and collectors.
The author:
Andrew Lang (1844–1912) was a Scottish writer, poet, literary critic, anthropologist and folklorist, remembered especially for the celebrated series of colour Fairy Books that began with The Blue Fairy Book in 1889. His collections introduced English-speaking readers to an extraordinary range of traditional stories gathered from cultures around the world.
Lang possessed a remarkable ability to preserve the atmosphere of traditional storytelling while shaping tales for a contemporary readership. The Arabian Nights Entertainments reflects the same fascination with folklore, marvels and imaginative literature that made his fairy books classics of the Golden Age of illustrated publishing.
The illustrator:
Henry Justice Ford (1860–1941) was one of the most important British illustrators associated with Andrew Lang’s fairy books and collections of mythology and folklore. His highly detailed pen-and-ink drawings are distinguished by dramatic composition, elaborate costume and architecture, and a particular talent for supernatural and fantastic subjects.
Ford’s illustrations for The Arabian Nights are especially effective, moving effortlessly from richly ornamented interiors to monstrous genies, enchanted beings and moments of high adventure. Together with the magnificent gilt publisher’s binding, they make this First Edition a particularly attractive example of late Victorian illustrated book production.