Beschreibung:

DICKENS, Charles (1812-1870). The Old Curiosity Shop . London: [Bradbury and Evans for] Chapman and Hall, 1841. [ With, pasted in: ] Autograph quotation signed (‘Charles Dickens’), ‘Dear, gentle, patient, noble Nell was dead!’, 29 May 1846. 90 x 110mm. Quired in 6s (253 x 166mm). With the dedication leaf to Samuel Rogers but without the preface leaf (neither of which are called for by Smith), illustrations in the text by George Cattermole and Hablot K. Browne ["Phiz"] (some pale spotting and marginal finger-soiling, a few corners lightly creased). Contemporary full polished calf, gilt-ruled covers, gilt-decorated spine, red and green morocco lettering pieces, edges gilt, ink stamp of the publishers Chapman and Hall on front free endpaper and of the binder Hayday on rear free endpaper (some minor scuffing and rubbing). Provenance : gift inscription dated 1844 on front endpaper. Autograph quotation of one of Dickens's most famous sentences; in the first separate edition of the work in one of the presentation bindings by Hayday commissioned directly by Dickens and his publishers . The death of Little Nell was one of Dickens's most famous dramatic creations during his lifetime, inspiring feverish speculation during the serialisation of the work, with fans at the New York docks supposedly shouting to an incoming ship, 'Is Little Nell dead?'; Daniel O'Connell is said to have burst into tears and proclaimed 'he should not have killed her!' before throwing the volume out of a train window on reading of her death, whilst Dickens's friend W.C. Macready wrote in his diary 'I have never read printed words that gave me such pain'. For the following generation, however, Dickens's emotive manipulation around Little Nell's death became a target for satire, most famously in Oscar Wilde's quip 'One must have a heart of stone to read the death of Little Nell without laughing' (recorded by Ada Leverson in Letters to the Sphinx , 1930). In spite of its fame, autograph quotations of this sentence are rare, and ABPC/RBH have only one other example at auction in the last 30 years . The present quotation is dated the eve of Dickens's departure for a continental tour, during which he was to embark on the composition of Dombey and Son : his only recorded letter for this date is a brief note to the poet R.H. Horne describing it as 'the busiest of days'. The binding is an appealing example of the work of James Hayday, from whom Dickens and his publishers, Chapman and Hall, commissioned their special presentation bindings (John Forster in The Life of Charles Dickens records the author's pleasure in Hayday's 'extra-super' bindings). The binding of this copy is nearly uniform with that on the copy Dickens inscribed and gave to his friend Macready as a Christmas present in 1841 (Self Collection, Christie's New York, 2 April 2008, lot 77). This separate issue of The Old Curiosity Shop was created from portions of Master Humphrey's Clock , accounting for the irregularities of its bibliographic composition. Smith I:6A.