The Little Minister

NY: Lovell, Coryell & Co.. Very Good with No dust jacket as issued. 1891. First American Edition. First Printing. Hard Cover. Rebound in half blue cloth over blue silk boards, spine in six compartments separated by gilt borders, gilt lettering in two compartments, gilt tooling in remainder, double gilt borders on cover, fore-edge deckle. The Little Minister by J. M. Barrie was first published in "Good Words" magazine, spanning the months January to December 1891. Reckoned to be Barrie's best work, his third, it is one of several novels about the fictional village of "Thrums", said to be modeled on Barrie's home town of Kirriemuir. In 1840's Scotland, a young Scottish pastor falls in love with an educated, radiant gypsy girl, who turns out to be a peeress who impersonates a gypsy and smoothes things over between rebellious weavers and the authorities. The play version, produced by the legendary Charles Frohman, was a tremendous success in which the star, according to William Winter's review Jan. 10, 1897 "expressed impulse, pertness, perversity, caprice, discontent. mischief, longing, self-will, arch and tantalizing sweetness and charmingly irrational contradictions of an impetuous girl." It was made into a RKO movie in 1934 with Katharine Hepburn and John Beal (as the Scottish Minister). According to Maltin's Movie Guide, "Hepburn was radiant.". Head and heel very lightly worn, pages toned but supple, else fine; unmarked, tight, square, and clean. VERY GOOD. . 8vo 8" - 9" tall. 329, (4-adverts) pp .