Author: COLERIDGE. SAMUEL TAYLOR. -- DORE. GUSTAV. ILLUSTRATES.
Title: THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER.
Description: Dore Gallery. Hamilton, Adams, and Co. London. 1876. SECOND EDITION. Large folio. (19.9 x 16.1 inches). 12 pages of text plus 38 full page illustrated wood engraved plates. Half title, title page (printed in red and black) with circular vignette, frontispiece, 2 engraved vignettes at start and end of the text, 38 full page engraved plates with the title printed below the image. Publishers bright red cloth binding with elaborate blind tooled decorative borders to both boards. Front board lettered in gilt. pale blue coated endpapers. Small stain to the bottom of the page on the first 8 leaves and a few minor smudges throughout. Pages mounted onto tabs to allow the book to open flat. Some of these tabs have tears to the bottom two or three inches but all are holding firm and the book is intact throughout. Overall a very good copy of this scarce edition, far superior to later editions in printing and format. Certainly one of Dore's crowning achievements, The Ancient Mariner was not a success at first. Dore published this work himself in 1875, paying £3,500 for the engraving and printing of the plates. He considered it to be one of his best and most original works and it was well received by critics but sales were poor. It is very likely that the sheets used for this edition are those unsold ones produced for the 1875 edition. A very good copy of a remarkable book.

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