Great Expectations.

London: Chapman and Hall,, 1861. Original cloth, with all the points of first issue First edition, first impression, published on 6 July 1861; both the rarest and most valuable of Dickens's works, and, arguably, his greatest. Copies in the original cloth are particularly desirable. Five impressions of the first edition were printed, each of the latter four with a new edition statement on the title page. The modern bibliographical authority is the table given in Appendix D to the Clarendon edition, 1993, in which Margaret Cardwell agrees with the traditional conclusion that the same setting of type was used for all five impressions: "there is no warrant for treating the five impressions as distinct editions" (p. 491). However, she deduces the impressions were sequential and that minor corrections and gradual deterioration of type can be shown across the five impressions, allowing the first impression to be identified even when the title page is tampered with or absent. Patten states that 1,000 copies of the first impression were printed and that probably most of these copies were purchased by Mudie's Select Library where, as circulating library copies, they inevitably suffered a high rate of attrition, leading to their renowned rarity. This copy contains the earliest state of every point outlined in the Clarendon edition. The third volume here contains the numeral "3" in the pagination on p. 103, and the "i" in "inflexible" on p. 193, which are sometimes missing in copies of the first impression of the third volume, indicating that the present copy is among the earlier printings of the first impression. This copy also has the early reading of vol. 3, p. 192, with "himself" and "very carefully" on separate lines. Three volumes, octavo. Original violet wavy-grained cloth, spines lettered in gilt, covers with floral decoration within linear border stamped in blind, cream endpapers. Housed in a custom blue cloth folding box. Vol. III bound without 32pp. catalogue. Monogram bookplates, "P.H.G." (or "H.P.G."); afterwards in the library of Sir Brent Gration-Maxfield, his ownership inscriptions dated 1974, his sale, Sotheby Parke Bernet, 9-10 Feb. 1981, lot 72. Some expert repairs at foot of spines, relined at an early date with matching yellow contemporary paper, rubbing and slight staining to cloth, faint shadow of removed labels to front covers, spines and edges darkened, some minor spotting at ends, closed marginal tear at vol. II, N6, corner repair to vol. III, I2. Smith, I, 14 (but superseded by Clarendon); Sadleir 688; Wolff 1799. Robert L. Patten, Charles Dickens and His Publishers, 1978.