Details
F[LETCHER], F. [Phineas] (1582-1650). The Purple Island, or The Isle of Man: Together with piscatorie eclogs and other poeticall miscellanies. [Cambridge]: Printers to the University of Cambridge, 1633.
Small 4° (182 x 138mm). Title printed in red and black within woodcut border. With one blank before Piscatorie eclogs. Piscatorie eclogs and Elisa with separate titles. Type-ornament borders and headpieces, university printer's device on title, a larger device repeated as tailpiece throughout, factotum and ornamental initials. (Lacks one blank, either Z4 or chi1, one or two small spots.) Crimson morocco gilt by W. Pratt, spine lettered in gilt in two compartments, the others lavishly decorated with floral motifs, gilt turn-ins, gilt edges. Provenance: Henry Francis Redhead Yorke (bookplate) – S.A. Thompson Yates (bookplate).
ATTRACTIVE COPY OF THE FIRST EDITION. Fletcher's extended utopian allegorical poem uses an examination of the human body to investigate the body politic and absolute power. In so doing he describes in detail physical anatomy. Fletcher was strongly influenced by Spenser. He is addressed by Quarles in the present work as 'the Spencer of this age', and in William Thompson's opinion, The Purple Island "was the best in the Allegorical Way, (next to the Fairy Queen) in the English language" (cf. Hayward). Grolier, Langland to Wither, 101; Hayward 67; Pforzheimer 376; STC 11082; Westwood and Satchell 95.
Special notice
No VAT on hammer price or buyer's premium.
Brought to you by
Eugenio Donadoni