Beschreibung:

WHITMAN, WALT The Complete Writings of Walt Whitman . New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1902. One of 32 sets only of the Author's Manuscript Edition, each volume numbered and signed on behalf of the publisher, this set number 20. Ten volumes, bound in full dark-green levant at The Knickerbocker Press, the covers with an overall floral design in gilt surrounding a central lozenge onlaid in red, the spine in six compartments with raised bands, red moire silk endsheets, top edge gilt. 9 1/2 x 7 inches (24 x 17 cm); frontispieces in two states, the manuscript leaf bound into the first volume together with a hand-engrossed certification leaf signed by Jeanette Gilder. Laid in is the original publisher's receipt, which indicates that the set cost $500 upon publication. Spines slightly darkened, some minor wear, and a small defect resulting in loss of leather to the lower forecorner of the dentelles in the first volume. Internally, this is a fresh copy. The manuscript in this set is a leaf from the first (or early) draft of Specimen Days, chapter 153 The East, which incorporates three lines of verse from The Errand Bearers (the whole of which was first published in The New York Times, June 27, 1860). Retitled A Broadway Pageant this poem was ultimately incorporated into the 1871 edition of Leaves of Grass. The manuscript has a number of strike-throughs and emendations. Though just a three-line quotation, any portion of Leaves of Grass in Whitman's hand is desirable. BAL 21454A; Meyerson B4. C