BOUHOURS (Dominique):

The Art of Criticism: Or, The Method Of making a Right Jjudgment upon Subjects of Wit and Learning. Translated from the best Edition of the French, of the famous Father Bohours [sic], by a Person of Quality. In Four Dialogues.

London: Printed for D. Brown, at the Black Swan without Temple-bar; and A. Roper at the Black Boy against St. Dunstan's church in Fleetstreet, 1705. FIRST ENGLISH TRANSLATION. 8vo, 182 x 112 mms., pp. [viii], 176; 120 [121 - 135 index, 136 errata], contemporary panelled calf; top and base of spine chipped, front joint slightly cracked, and front hinge more obviously cracked, but firm. A good copy. Dominique Bouhours (1628 - 1702) published La Manière de bien penser sur les ouvrages d'esprit in 1687, and it was first translated into English in 1705 as The Art of Criticism, probably translated by Abel Roper. The work made some noise among the literati of the 18th century with Alexader Pope borrowing material for his Essay on Criticism. The exposition is managed as a dialogue between Eudoxus and Philanthus. I am not quite sure what the translator means by "best Editon of the French," as the only one I can find is the first of 1687 - by definition the "best."

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Book number: 10541

Catalogue: Literary criticism

Keywords: literary criticism dialogues literature

BOYLE (Charles):

Dr Bentley's Dissertations on the Epistles of Phalaris, and the Fables of AEsop, Examin'd. The Fourth Edition With some Additions, occasioned by a Book entituled A View of the Dissertation upon the Epistles of Phalaris, &c.

London: London, Printed for M. coooper..., 1745. 8vo, 197 x 119, pp. [viii], 266 [ 267 - 270 Index], contemporary calf, gilt spine, red leather label; joints slightly cracked, some general wear to binding, but a good to very good copy. Sir William Temple's incautious observations on the authentic antiquity of the epistles of Phalaris in an essay on "Ancient and Modern Learning" in part two of his Miscellanea (1690) called forth William Wotton's Reflections on Ancient and Modern Learning (1694), in which Temple's tentative conjecture was severely criticized. In 1695, Charles Boyle, fourth Earl of Orrery, began preparation for an edition of the epistles in which Temple's view as to their antiquity would be asserted, but he included injudicious comments about the courtesy and integrity of the scholar Richard Bentley. In his work, Wotton defended Bentley vigorously, and Boyle, with the assistance of various witlings at Christ Church College, Oxford, replied with his book in 1698. The controversy eventually prompted Swift to produce his Battle of the Books. Wing O471.

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Book number: 9282

Catalogue: Textual criticism

Keywords: textual criticism scholarship prose

ELTON (Oliver):

A Survey of English Literature, 1730 - 1780.

London: Edward Arnold & Co., 1928. FIRST EDITION. 2 volumes. 8vo, pp. xix [xx blank], 412; xiv, 367 [368 blank], 16 pp. adverts for Arnold's autumn 1928 publications, original cloth. A very good set. From the library of John Dover Wilson ("J. D. Wilson"), with his autograph in pencil on the front free end-paper.

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Book number: 3836

Catalogue: Criticism

Keywords: criticism

FALEREO (Demetrio), i. e., Demetrius of Phaleron:

Della Locuzione Volgarizato da Pier Segni Accademico della Crusca Detto L'Agghiacciato. Con postille al testo, ed esempli Foscani, conformati a' Greci. Al Sereniss. Signore, il Sig. Don Cosimo Medici, Principe di Toscana, suo Signore.

In Firenze, Nella Stamperia di Cosimo Giunti, 1603. FIRST EDITION of this translation. Small 4to, 205 x 148 mms., pp. [viiii], 280, contemporary vellum, letter in ink on spine, paste-down end-papers with notes in an 18th century hand; front hinge cracked, exposing spine, binding a little soiled. The orator Demetrius of Phaleron (c. 350 B. C. - c. 280 B. C.) was one of the most prolific authors of antiquity, noted in particular for his historical works and those on rhetoric. De Elocutione was first published in 1588, edited by A. P. Manutius. The translator here is Pier Segni, with numerous annotations to the text. The attribution of this work on style to Demetrius has been disputed and is sometimes attributed to an unknown writer in the second century A. D. Most libraries, however, catalogue the work under Demetrius' name.

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Book number: 7243

Catalogue: Literary criticism

Keywords: literary criticism style prose

GOLDSMITH (Oliver):

Essays and Criticisms, By Dr. Goldsmith; With An Account of the Author.

London: Printed for J. Johnson, St. Paul's Church-Yard..., 1798. FIRST COLLECTED EDITION. 3 volumes. 12mo, 172 x 98 mms., pp. [ii], vi [vii - viii Contents], 232; xxx [xxxi xxxii Contents], 238; [vi], 276, including half-title in volumes 2 and 3, engraved portrait (by T. Holloway after Sir Joshua Reynolds) as frontispiece in volume 1, contemporary tree calf, gilt spine; lacks all labels, but a very good set with the later autograph of "John Gladstone/ Liverpool" on the title-pages of volumes 1 and 2. Volume 1 is a republication of Essays by Mr. Goldsmith first published in 1765; the second and third volumes, which were edited by Thomas Wright, with the assistance of Isaac Reed, constitute a new collection. Many of the essays here ascribed to Goldsmith are almost certainly not by him. However, the notice in The Critical Review for 1798 claimed "The first volume of these Essays was published by Goldsmith himself; the other are now first collected. The internal evidence is sufficient to prove their authenticity, and the account given in the preface satisfactorily establishes that point."

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Book number: 8069

Catalogue: Criticism

Keywords: criticism essays literature

[HUNTER (Joseph), Rev.]:

Who Wrote Cavendish's Life of Wolsey?

London: Printed for Richard Rees No. 62, Pall Mall, by Richard and Arthur Taylor, Shoe Lane, 1814. FIRST EDITION. 4to, pp. [iv], 56, title-page in red and black, uncut, original boards, with printed label on front cover, hand-written paper label on spine; slightly soiled, spine repaired at early stage. With the bookplate, on front pastedown, stating that this volume was "Presented to the Bath Royal Literary & Scientific Institution by Frederick Shum, Esq. F. S. A.", with Shum's name neatly added in manuscript. In 1814 the book Who Wrote Cavendish's Life of Wolsey? was published anonymously in a small print-run of just one hundred copies. The inscription in the copy on offer, however, gives the author's identity: "T. Broadhurst / 1816 / from the Rev. J. Hunter, / the Author". Here we see the author, the Rev. John Hunter (1783-1861), giving the volume to Rev. Thomas Broadhurst (1767-1851) in 1816, two years after the publication of the book. Both Hunter and Broadhurst lived in Bath; both were Unitarian ministers; and both were writers. Wrong or fragmentary attributions of Who Wrote Cavendish's Life of Wolsey? have been made over the years to, for example, the publisher Richard Rees and to simply "J. H." Eventually Sylvester Joseph Hunter (1829-1896), the son of the Rev. Joseph Hunter (1783-1861), stated in print that the writer of Who Wrote Cavendish's Life of Wolsey (1814) was indeed his father, for which see Sylvester Joseph Hunter's Brief Memoir of the Late Joseph Hunter, F.S.A., with a Descriptive Catalogue of His Separate Publications (1861), pp. 13-14. The inscription in this copy, however, is a satisfyingly contemporary first-hand attestation in manuscript to the authorship. At some point after Thomas Broadhurst's ownership of the volume, it went to the bibliographer Frederick Shum, the compiler of A Catalogue of Bath Books (1913), who was himself a Bath-based scholar. From Shum it went directly to the Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution. With the contemporary MS attribution, and the chain of distinctly antiquarian provenance, this is likely the best extant copy of a book important to historical scholarship.

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Book number: 3885

Catalogue: Literary criticism

Keywords: literary criticism biography literature

MILTON (John). [NEVE (Philip)]:

Cursory Remarks on some of the Ancient English Poets, Particularly Milton.

London {n. p.], 1789. FIRST EDITION. 8vo, pp. [ii], iii [iv blank], 146, later 19th century calf, rebacked, gilt rules, morocco label; ex-library (Oakland Free Library) with library bookplate on front paste-down end-paper, library stamp on recto of front free end-paper and title-page, catalogue note on contents page, corners worn, covers scratched. Neve published this privately, and only 200 copies were printed. However, copies seem to turn up very regularly, and ESTC locates about 40 copies. Coleridge 369.

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Book number: 2261

Catalogue: Criticism

Keywords: criticism poetry literature

SHAKESPEARE. [HEATH (Benjamin)]:

A Revisal of Shakespear's Text, wherein The Alterations introduced into it by the modern Editors and Critics, are particularly considered.

London: Printed for W. Johnston..., 1765. FIRST EDITION. 8vo, 216 x 135 mms., pp. xiv, [iv Contents and Errata], 573 [574 blank], dedication (to Henry Home, Lord Kames) leaf in cancelled state,contemporary straight-grain plum morocco, spine gilt in compartments with titles blocked in gilt, all edges gilt; joints a bit rubbed, some slight general wear to binding, but a very good copy, with the bookplate of the politician and Chancellor of the Exchequer Richard Austen [Rab] Butler (1902 - 1982) on the front paste-down end-paper of each volume. Heath (1704 - 1766) approves of Theobald's emendations but is rather less enthusiastic about those of Warburton. He was a notable literary scholar and book collector, and most of his publications were on classical literature. His book was one of two on Shakespeare to be purchased in 1770 by the Library Company of Philadelphia for its collection. Dr. Johnson made use of a number of Heath's comments for his own edition of Shakespeare.

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Book number: 7195

Catalogue: Literary criticism

Keywords: literary criticism textual criticism literature

TIRABOSCHI (Girolamo):

Histoire de la Littérature d'Italie, Tirée de l'Italien de Mr. Tiraboschi, et abrégée par Antoine Landi, Conseiller & Poëte de cour de Prusse, & Académicien Florentin.

Berne: [n. p.], 1784. 5 volumes. 8vo, pp. viii, 373 [374 blank]; 365 [366 blank]; 428; 536; 351 [352 blank], including half-title in each volume, original wrappers, uncut, spine worn, three wrappers detached, but a good example of a set as issued. Tiraboschi (1731 - 1794) produced 13 volumes of his Storia della letterature italiana, covering the origin and development of literature and the sciences from Etruscan times to 1700, between 1772 and 1782; an erudite and learned scholar, he was a bit long-winded, and Landi's abridgment has much to recommend it.

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Book number: 2898

Catalogue: Literary criticism

Keywords: literary criticism prose French