Books

2 volumes, 8vo, original drab boards with pink paper-covered spines as issued. First edition of Wordsworth's single greatest collection of poetry, one of 500 copies printed; with the cancels D11-12 in Vol. I and B2 in Vol. II. Volume I has the half-title and the erratum leaf H8. Volume II has the half-title, the sectional half-title leaf B1, and the first state of sheet F9(i) in volume 2 (with the misprint "Thy function" on page 98, last line). Wise 8. Tinker 2334. Ashley 8:12-14. Healey 19 (locating just six copies in original boards). Cornell/Healey 19-21. Wordsworth's Poems includes many of the poet's most beloved poems, including "She was a Phantom of delight", "To A Skylark", "Resolution and Independence", "The world is too much with us.", "It is a beauteous evening, calm and free", "The Solitary Reaper", "My heart leaps up when I behold.", "I wandered lonely as a cloud.", and the last, but certainly not the least, poem in the collection, Wordsworth's great "Ode", since known by its longer title "Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood". Contemporary ownership inscription to Anne Watson in Vol. I, with her pencil ownership signature on the title-page; bookplates of Simon Nowell-Smith and his wife. Light foxing, covers slightly chipped and worn, but a very good set.

Originally published in 1798 in collaboration with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 'Lyrical Ballads' is regarded as a seminal work in the English Romantic movement.