Books

London: Benjamin Motte, at the Middle-Temple-Gate in Fleet-street, 1726. A fine copy. Four parts in two volumes, octavo; portrait of Gulliver by John Sturt engraved by Robert Sheppard and six engraved plates, five of them maps, by H. Moll; 19th-century polished calf gilt, spine gilt between raised bands, green lettering pieces, triple fillet border on sides, marbled endpapers with gilt dentelle borders, gilt edges; binding by Francis Bedford with his stamp. First edition, first issue (Teerink "A"), with the portrait in second state as is more usual. This is a fine copy of one of the greatest of all works of English (and travel) literature. From its first publication the success of Gulliver was immediate and sustained, its influence enormous. Gove knew of over one hundred eighteenth century editions and there have been countless since. Although it had its famous detractors (notably Samuel Johnson's famously dismissive 'When once you have thought of the big men and little men, it is…

Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World, by Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships, better known as Gulliver's Travels (1726, amended 1735), is a prose satire by Irish writer and clergyman Jonathan Swift, satirizing both human nature and the 'travellers' tales' literary subgenre.