1905 Rare Edwardian illustrated edition - Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen
Author: Hans Christian Andersen.
Title: Fairy Tales.
Publisher: London, John F. Shaw & Co., 48 Paternoster Row, [circa 1905].
Language: Text in English.
Size: 10 x 7.5 inches.
Pages: 96 and 191 pages, complete in two parts bound in one volume.
Binding: Very good original publisher’s pictorial blue cloth binding, with a striking colour illustration to the front cover and decorated spine. Light rubbing to extremities and corners, minor wear to spine ends, and a few small marks to the rear board. Binding remains bright, sound, and highly attractive. Protected in a removable mylar cover.
Content: Very good condition. General age toning to pages, with occasional light foxing or minor marks. Early gift inscription dated Christmas 1906 on front blank. A well-preserved copy internally.
Illustrations: Illustrated with a colour frontispiece and numerous black and white illustrations throughout. Also includes charming period advertising endpapers and advertisements, adding strongly to the Edwardian character of the volume.
Estimate: (USD 200 – 250)
The book: Fairy Tales is a charming Edwardian illustrated edition of Hans Christian Andersen’s beloved stories, published in London by John F. Shaw & Co. around 1905. This large-format volume brings together two complete parts bound in one handsome pictorial cloth binding, including such classic tales as The Ugly Duckling, The Tinder Box, The Swineherd, The Girl Who Trod on the Loaf, The Marsh King’s Daughter, and Quite True!, among others.
The book is especially appealing for its vivid blue publisher’s binding, with a richly coloured fairy-tale scene to the front cover and a complementary illustrated figure on the spine. The period advertisements, including Fennings’ Children’s Powders, Epps’s Cocoa, Robinson’s Patent Barley, and Quaker Oats, give the volume a delightful turn-of-the-century atmosphere and make it an evocative survival of Edwardian children’s book culture.
The author: Hans Christian Andersen (1805–1875) was the Danish writer whose literary fairy tales became among the most enduring works of children’s literature. His stories combine wonder, melancholy, humour, moral feeling, and emotional depth, often speaking as powerfully to adults as to children. Tales such as The Ugly Duckling, The Little Mermaid, The Snow Queen, The Emperor’s New Clothes, and The Tinder Box helped define the modern fairy tale and secured Andersen’s place as one of the great storytellers of the nineteenth century.