THE POETICAL WORKS OF PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY

Early collected edition. Three volumes. Duodecimo. Beautiful contemporary full reddish brown calf, the boards single ruled in blind and double ruled with corner pieces in gilt. Outer board edges decorated in gilt. Five raised bands, elaborate gilt decorated compartments and titles in gilt on olive green morocco labels to the spines. Marbled endpapers, inner dentelles decorated in blind. All edges marbled. Engraved portrait frontispiece to volume one. A splendid set, the bindings square and firm with a little rubbing to the extremities. The contents, with a contemporary ownership inscription in pencil to the front blank of each volume, small indentations to the edge of the title page in volume I and just minor spotting to the margins are otherwise clean throughout.

The first complete edition of Percy Shelley's poetical works, complied and edited by his wife Mary Shelley was issued in 1839. Previously, Shelley's poetry had largely been brought before the public in a multiplicity of either private and small-run editions (many of which had become increasingly scarce) or pirated editions. Percy's father, Sir Timothy Shelley, feared that a new collected edition would be likely to draw fresh attention to the radical writings of his son. Recognising, however, that obscurity was unlikely in any case, he relented and dropped his objections to Mary producing an official edition. After having attempted to do so since her husband's death in 1822, Mary thus brought Percy's work into the mainstream. Her notes, which added significantly to the fuller comprehension of Percy's poetic writings, have since become inseparable from the texts themselves and her endeavours ultimately served to secure his position as one of the foremost poets of the English language.