Details
[FIELDING, HENRY]. An authentic copy in the hand of an unidentified amanuensis of Samuel Richardson's of the highly important autograph letter written to Richardson by Henry Fielding dated 15 October 1748. 1 1/2 pages, small 4to, (continued length-wise on verso for half a page), closely written (more than 900 words), two tiny fold holes injuring a few letters in a word, a very small marginal chip, mounting paper covering blank portion of verso touching a few letters in postscript, slight browning. In the first half of the letter Fielding lavishly praises Richardson's novel Clarissa (he had just received and read the fifth volume of the book's seven volumes); in the second half Fielding writes of literary fame: "...And sure the World will not suppose me inclined to flatter one whom they will suppose me to hate if they will be pleased to recollect that we are Rivals for that coy Mrs. Fame..."
The original Fielding letter is not known to exist. Another copy of it, also by a Richardson amanuensis, is in a European institution; that copy, however, is only of the first part of the letter dealing with Clarissa. This present copy is discussed and quoted from in Professor Martin C. Battestin's definitive Henry Fielding. A Life (London and New York, 1989); its text will be included in his forthcoming edition of Fielding's letters. In 1948 Professor E.L. McAdam, Jr., who had purchased this copy in an album of autographs from an Oxford bookseller (see lot for the album) wrote an article about it: "A New Letter from Fielding" in The Yale Review, Vol. XXXVIII, No. 2, Winter 1949, pp. 300-310 (a copy of which is included in this lot). At the time he believed it to be an original letter in Fielding's handwriting and this assumption remained until Professor Battestin was supplied with a photograph of it in 1987.
Christie's wishes to thank Professor Martin C. Battestin of the Department of English, University of Virginia, for his invaluable assistance in the cataloguing of this item.
The original Fielding letter is not known to exist. Another copy of it, also by a Richardson amanuensis, is in a European institution; that copy, however, is only of the first part of the letter dealing with Clarissa. This present copy is discussed and quoted from in Professor Martin C. Battestin's definitive Henry Fielding. A Life (London and New York, 1989); its text will be included in his forthcoming edition of Fielding's letters. In 1948 Professor E.L. McAdam, Jr., who had purchased this copy in an album of autographs from an Oxford bookseller (see lot for the album) wrote an article about it: "A New Letter from Fielding" in The Yale Review, Vol. XXXVIII, No. 2, Winter 1949, pp. 300-310 (a copy of which is included in this lot). At the time he believed it to be an original letter in Fielding's handwriting and this assumption remained until Professor Battestin was supplied with a photograph of it in 1987.
Christie's wishes to thank Professor Martin C. Battestin of the Department of English, University of Virginia, for his invaluable assistance in the cataloguing of this item.