1907 First Edition of the Miniature Edition - Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

The scarce first printing of Macmillan’s 1907 “Miniature Edition” of Lewis Carroll’s enduring classic, preserving John Tenniel’s complete suite of forty-two iconic illustrations in an unusually attractive compact format.

Author: Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson].
Title: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.
Publisher: London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1907.
Edition: First Edition of the “Miniature Edition,” First Printing.
Language: English.
Pages: 204 pages, including the concluding greetings and publisher’s advertisements.
Size: 6 x 4 inches.
Binding: Near fine original red cloth binding, ruled in blind to the boards, with gilt lettering to the spine and the charming gilt circular vignette of Alice to the front board. Binding firm and well preserved, with only very minor age wear and a small mark to the rear board as shown. Protected in a removable mylar cover. 
Content: Very good content, bright, clean and firmly bound, with occasional light spotting and age toning, somewhat more noticeable to the endpapers. Contemporary gift inscription dated Christmas 1909 to the front free endpaper and a small period bookseller’s label to the front pastedown, as shown.
Illustrations: Complete with the forty-two celebrated black-and-white illustrations by John Tenniel, including the frontispiece.

Estimate: US$350–400.

The book: First published in 1865, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland became one of the defining works of English children’s literature. Macmillan introduced this delightful “Miniature Edition” in 1907, preserving the appearance and celebrated Tenniel illustrations of the classic Macmillan Alice in a particularly appealing small format. This copy is from the first printing of that new edition and retains its bright original red cloth in notably pleasing condition.

The miniature edition was issued in three impressions during 1907, beginning in July, followed by September and December; copies of the first impression are consequently especially desirable within the long publishing history of Alice. 

The author: Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832–1898), better known as Lewis Carroll, was an English mathematician, photographer, clergyman and writer whose extraordinary command of wordplay, logic and fantasy produced Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Through the Looking-Glass and The Hunting of the Snark. His Alice books have remained continuously influential in literature, illustration and popular culture.

The illustrator: Sir John Tenniel (1820–1914) was one of the foremost British illustrators and political cartoonists of the nineteenth century. His forty-two illustrations for Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland established the visual identities of Alice, the White Rabbit, the Cheshire Cat, the Mad Hatter and the inhabitants of Wonderland, becoming inseparable from Carroll’s text.