TESS OF THE D'URBERVILLES: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented.

First edition in book form, first printing. Three volumes. Publisher's original light brown cloth with honey-suckle design after Charles Ricketts in gilt to the upper board, titles in gilt to the spine. Bottom edge untrimmed. Half titles are present as called for in all three volumes. A very good copy, the bindings firm, with bumping and minor fraying to the corners and tips of the slightly rolled spines. The cloth is somewhat darkened, volume I with a few dark marks to the right edge of upper board, volumes II and III with the rectangular shadow of a removed paper label to the upper board, the gilt however remains uniformly bright. The contents, with some offsetting to the endpapers and light spotting here and there, are otherwise clean and without inscriptions or stamps.

A decent example in the original cloth of Hardy's fictional masterpiece, of which only 1000 copies of the first edition were issued (in November 1891). This copy has all of the requisite first issue points present, as called for. The story was first published as a weekly serial between July and December 1891 in 'The Graphic', although in censored form (the episodes dealing with the seduction of Tess by Alec d'Urberville and the baptism and death of Tess's child were removed by the editor). "This temporary dismemberment of the novel necessitated changes in plot, such as the introduction of a mock marriage and the omission of the encounter with the painter of texts, and there were numerous scattered bowdlerizations and omissions. When the novel was published in book form the original text was, of course, restored, and Hardy was able to 'piece the trunk and limbs of the novel together, as originally written'" (Purdy pp. 67-78; Sadleir 1114).