Tolstoy, Leo (1828-1910) & Clara Bell (1835-1927) translator. First American edition of War and Peace.
New York: William S. Gottsberger, 1886.
First English language edition, six octavo volumes; with the cursive imprint in each part except the second; bound in publisher's pictorial burgundy cloth stamped in gilt and black, brown coated endpapers; all housed in a custom morocco-backed clamshell box (faint marginal toning; all volumes recased with original endpapers and spines preserved, minor chips to coated endpapers, light dampstains to endpapers, lower edge and fore edge of part 2); 6 1/4 x 4 3/8 in. (6)
This complex masterpiece of Russian literature was written by Tolstoy over a span of seven years. Its unique mix of historical, philosophical, and literary prose enshrined War and Peace as a pillar of world literature. Even Tolstoy's enemy, Ivan Turgenev, referred to the work as "one of the most remarkable books of our age."
