1912 Rare 1stED - ELFIN SONG, A Book of Verse and Pictures by Florence Harrison
An enchanting first edition of Florence Harrison’s celebrated fairy poetry book, richly illustrated with mounted colour plates and elaborate black-and-white designs in a beautifully gilt-decorated binding.
Author: Florence Harrison.
Title: Elfin Song: A Book of Verse and Pictures.
Publisher: London, Glasgow & Bombay, Blackie & Son Ltd., MCMXII (1912).
Edition: First Edition.
Language: English.
Pages: xii, 142 pages.
Size: 9" x 6.5".
Binding: Very good original grey cloth binding, richly decorated in gilt to the front board and spine with an elegant fairy motif and ornamental lettering. Upper edge gilt. Light rubbing and wear to the extremities, with minor softening at the spine ends, but the gilt remains bright and the binding is tight and sound. Protected in a removable mylar cover.
Content: Very good. Pages remain generally clean and well preserved with occasional light foxing and age toning, chiefly to margins and preliminary leaves. Contemporary ownership inscription “Joyce Briscome, Xmas 1913” to the front free endpaper. One original lettered protective tissue guard has been replaced by a plain blank tissue guard by a previous owner; all illustrations themselves are present and complete.
Illustrations: Complete with 12 beautiful mounted colour plates, together with 12 full-page black-and-white plates and numerous decorative illustrations, headings, vignettes, and ornaments throughout, all by Florence Harrison. Eleven of the colour plates retain their original lettered tissue guards, with one guard replaced by a plain protective tissue as noted above.
Estimate: USD 750–850.
The book:
Elfin Song is one of Florence Harrison’s most desirable illustrated books, combining her own poetry with a remarkable sequence of fairy imagery influenced by the Pre-Raphaelite and Art Nouveau traditions. Published by Blackie & Son in 1912, the volume moves through a dreamlike world of fairies, changelings, witches, banshees, winter spirits, enchanted woods, and moonlit revels. Harrison’s delicate line drawings appear throughout the text, while the mounted colour plates display the rich, atmospheric palette for which her work is especially admired.
The book represents the height of the Edwardian gift-book tradition, when publishers lavished exceptional attention on typography, binding design, paper, and illustration. The gilt fairy figure on the upper board, elaborate decorative pages, tissue-guarded colour plates, and abundance of black-and-white artwork make Elfin Song a particularly unified example of book design. Complete copies retaining all twelve mounted colour plates are increasingly sought after by collectors of fairy literature, Golden Age illustration, and Pre-Raphaelite-inspired art.
The author and illustrator:
Florence Susan Harrison (1877–1955) was an English-Australian artist, poet, and illustrator best remembered for her richly imaginative interpretations of fairy subjects, poetry, and legend. Born in Brisbane, she later lived in England and became closely associated with Blackie & Son, for whom she produced some of the most distinctive illustrated gift books of the early twentieth century. Her work blends Pre-Raphaelite romanticism with Art Nouveau line and colour, often populated by fairies, spirits, medieval figures, and mysterious woodland landscapes.
Harrison also illustrated works by Christina Rossetti, William Morris, and Alfred Tennyson, placing her firmly within the later visual tradition inspired by the Pre-Raphaelite movement. Elfin Song, in which she supplied both verse and pictures, is among the purest expressions of her personal artistic world and remains one of her most collectible books.