May 23, 2024 - Sale 2670

Sale 2670 - Lot 18

Price Realized: $ 2,750
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,000 - $ 1,500
Austen, Jane (1775-1817)
Pride and Prejudice, the Peacock Edition.

London: George Allen, 1894.

First edition thus, octavo, illustrated with frontispiece (original tissue guard preserved) and more than 150 text illustrations by Hugh Thomson; bound in green publisher's cloth gilt stamped, front board decorated with the iconic peacock motif in gilt, all edges gilt, black coated endpapers (lightly toned at margins, offsetting from tissue guard at title; corners rubbed, spine a bit dull with caps just pushed and starting to fray, adhesive residue on front pastedown); 7 1/8 x 4 5/8 in.

Despite the publication of earlier illustrated editions, Hugh Thomson's illustrations and decorations are the first to truly incorporate Austen's sense of humor into their composition, decisively establishing them as the most famous depictions of the Bennet family et al.

Gilson E78.