THE ELIZABETHAN STAGE. In Four Volumes.

First edition, first printing. Complete in four volumes. Publisher's original brown cloth, with gilt titles to the spine, borders stamped in blind to the boards and spine, and with gilt insignia to the upper board. With a black and white frontispiece in each volume, two black and white illustrations in volumes II and III, and five black and white illustrations in volume IV. A very good set, the bindings firm with a little bumping to the spine tips and corners, the cloth a little rubbed at the edges and with light fading to the bottom of the spines of volumes III and IV. The inner hinges in volumes II, III, and IV are cracked but holding. The contents, with a previous owner's signature in black ink to the front endpapers of each volume and with a couple instances of pencilled marginalia by Dr Richard Rowland in volume II and III, and a small pen notation in volume III, are otherwise clean throughout.

A decent set with an interesting provenance. Each volume with the ownership inscription and date '15/6/[19]45' of Margaret Hubbard (1924-2011), an Australian-born British classical scholar, best known for her study of Propertius (1974) and for her academic and romantic connection to noted novelist Iris Murdoch, who dedicated her 1962 novel 'An Unofficial Rose' to her. Later from the library of (and with pencilled marginalia of) Dr Richard Rowland, editor and author on the Renaissance and classical mythology, and Senior Lecturer in the Department of English and Related Literature at the University of York. Shakespeare scholar Sir Ernest Kerchever Chambers' seminal work on Elizabethan drama remains a standard resource for early modern drama students and scholars today.