Books

First edition, bound from the original parts in the publisher's cloth, of Dickens's last completed novel. "Our Mutual Friend had a mixed reception (the young Henry James's harshly dismissive review in The Nation is notorious) but its stock has risen dramatically in recent years and it is now generally regarded as one of his very greatest works" (ODNB). Two vols, octavo. Original purple cloth, Virtue binder's ticket to rear pastedown, spines lettered in gilt, covers panelled in blind, light yellow endpapers. With 40 wood engravings including frontispieces; 4pp. publisher's catalogue at rear dated November 1865 in vol. II (not essential in either vol.). With the slip preceding p. 1, as Eckel calls for. Contemporary bookplate to front pastedowns of Netlam Rattray, cotton manufacturer in Preston. Neat repair at extremities and inner joints, spines a little sunned, contents clean. An excellent copy. Eckel pp. 94-5; Kremers pp. 112-117; Smith I, 15.

Charles Dickens's last completed novel, a work of satire and social commentary that paints a vivid portrait of the dualities of wealth and poverty in London.