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[SWIFT, Jonathan]. Directions to Servants. London: R. Dodsley and M. Cooper, 1745.
8° (190 x 124mm). (Title slightly soiled, first quire loose.) Disbound; red cloth case. Provenance: Britwell-Pforzheimer copy (according to a pencil note at head of title).
FIRST LONDON EDITION of Swift’s ironic rule book for servants. Written at intervals from 1704 onwards, his work remained unfinished. His speaker consistently recommends examples of bad conduct, behaviour which Swift clearly detested and yet somewhat obsessionally collected over so many years. Ehrenpreis notes that “he considered naming the book The Whole Duty of Servants, which would have created a sardonic parallel to The Whole Duty of Man” (Swift. iii. 834). Rothschild 2178; Teerink 785.
8° (190 x 124mm). (Title slightly soiled, first quire loose.) Disbound; red cloth case. Provenance: Britwell-Pforzheimer copy (according to a pencil note at head of title).
FIRST LONDON EDITION of Swift’s ironic rule book for servants. Written at intervals from 1704 onwards, his work remained unfinished. His speaker consistently recommends examples of bad conduct, behaviour which Swift clearly detested and yet somewhat obsessionally collected over so many years. Ehrenpreis notes that “he considered naming the book The Whole Duty of Servants, which would have created a sardonic parallel to The Whole Duty of Man” (Swift. iii. 834). Rothschild 2178; Teerink 785.