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Property of a Foundation
JOYCE, James. Ulysses. Paris: Shakespeare and Company, 1922.
Details
JOYCE, James. Ulysses. Paris: Shakespeare and Company, 1922.
4o. (Pale offsetting on half-title, inscription slightly bled, old glue remains beneath inscription presumably where bookplate removed.) Original "Greek flag" blue printed wrappers, uncut (some small losses at ends of spine, larger along the lower rear joint, a few small nicks to edges, but an unsophisticated copy).
Provenance: Annie Winifred Ellerman (1894-1983, remnants of bookplate [see below]), known as Bryher, novelist, poet, magazine editor, and companion to the poet Hilda Doolittle (H.D.). She and her husband at the time, Robert McAlmon, befriended Joyce in Paris in 1921 and helped finance publication of Ulysses, McAlmon also serving as Joyce's typist for sections of the manuscript. The bookplate was designed by George Plank (1883-1965) using an Icelandic theme. Bryher traveled several times to Iceland, first in 1929, accompanied by H.D. and their friend Robert Herring, editor of a literary journal Bryher financed in the '30s and '40s, Life and Letters Today. His pencil initials also appear on the flyleaf. The bookplate was partially torn out by H.D. during a nervous breakdown in 1946, when she and Bryher were living at Lowndes Square, London; by descent to the present owner.
FIRST EDITION, LIMITED ISSUE, ONE OF 100 COPIES ON DUTCH HANDMADE PAPER, this copy number 41, signed by Joyce on the limitation page.
The impact of Joyce's Ulysses was revolutionary in its own time, and the book continues to stand as the single most significant English language novel of the last century. The complexities of its formal structure, its linguistic inventiveness and its imaginitive cohesion of historical sources have made Ulysses the most diligently studied work of modern literature in English. Cyril Connolly, while criticizing Joyce's "preference for language rather than people," nevertheless could not reject the novel's immense intellectual weight: "somehow it does achieve greatness like a ruined temple soaring from a jungle -- and should be judged perhaps as a poem, a festival of the imagination."
The first printing consisted of 1,000 copies, divided into three various limitations. The first 100 copies were printed on fine handmade paper, numbered 1-100, and signed by Joyce (as here). Copies 101-250 were also printed on handmade paper, though of a lesser grade than the first 100, and were not signed by Joyce. The final 750 copies were numbered 251-1,000, printed on the least expensive stock of paper, and like the previous limitation, were not signed by Joyce.
A FINE ASSOCIATION COPY, owned by the novelist and editor Bryher who helped finance and support numerous other publishers, including Sylvia Beach. She also gave financial support to writers, including Joyce and Edith Sitwell, and counted among her circle of friends Gertrude Stein, Ernest Hemingway and Berenice Abbott. The Modern Movement 42; Slocum & Cahoon A17.
4o. (Pale offsetting on half-title, inscription slightly bled, old glue remains beneath inscription presumably where bookplate removed.) Original "Greek flag" blue printed wrappers, uncut (some small losses at ends of spine, larger along the lower rear joint, a few small nicks to edges, but an unsophisticated copy).
Provenance: Annie Winifred Ellerman (1894-1983, remnants of bookplate [see below]), known as Bryher, novelist, poet, magazine editor, and companion to the poet Hilda Doolittle (H.D.). She and her husband at the time, Robert McAlmon, befriended Joyce in Paris in 1921 and helped finance publication of Ulysses, McAlmon also serving as Joyce's typist for sections of the manuscript. The bookplate was designed by George Plank (1883-1965) using an Icelandic theme. Bryher traveled several times to Iceland, first in 1929, accompanied by H.D. and their friend Robert Herring, editor of a literary journal Bryher financed in the '30s and '40s, Life and Letters Today. His pencil initials also appear on the flyleaf. The bookplate was partially torn out by H.D. during a nervous breakdown in 1946, when she and Bryher were living at Lowndes Square, London; by descent to the present owner.
FIRST EDITION, LIMITED ISSUE, ONE OF 100 COPIES ON DUTCH HANDMADE PAPER, this copy number 41, signed by Joyce on the limitation page.
The impact of Joyce's Ulysses was revolutionary in its own time, and the book continues to stand as the single most significant English language novel of the last century. The complexities of its formal structure, its linguistic inventiveness and its imaginitive cohesion of historical sources have made Ulysses the most diligently studied work of modern literature in English. Cyril Connolly, while criticizing Joyce's "preference for language rather than people," nevertheless could not reject the novel's immense intellectual weight: "somehow it does achieve greatness like a ruined temple soaring from a jungle -- and should be judged perhaps as a poem, a festival of the imagination."
The first printing consisted of 1,000 copies, divided into three various limitations. The first 100 copies were printed on fine handmade paper, numbered 1-100, and signed by Joyce (as here). Copies 101-250 were also printed on handmade paper, though of a lesser grade than the first 100, and were not signed by Joyce. The final 750 copies were numbered 251-1,000, printed on the least expensive stock of paper, and like the previous limitation, were not signed by Joyce.
A FINE ASSOCIATION COPY, owned by the novelist and editor Bryher who helped finance and support numerous other publishers, including Sylvia Beach. She also gave financial support to writers, including Joyce and Edith Sitwell, and counted among her circle of friends Gertrude Stein, Ernest Hemingway and Berenice Abbott. The Modern Movement 42; Slocum & Cahoon A17.