Author: HOWELL, JAMES
Title: Epistolae Ho-Elianae: Familiar Letters, Domestic and Forren. Divided Into Four Books: Partly Historical, Political, Philosophical. Upon Emergent Occasions.
Description: London: Thomas Guy, 1673. Fourth Edition. First Printing. Leather. Publisher's full brown calf, spine in six compartments separated by raised bands,gilt lettering on black label in one compartment, blind-stamped tooling in remainder, blind stamped borders on covers, t.e.g, marbled endpapers. James Howell (c1594-1666) was a 17th-century Anglo-Welsh historian and writer who is in many ways a representative figure of his age. The son of a Welsh clergyman, he was for much of his life in the shadow of his elder brother Thomas Howell, who became Lord Bishop of Bristol. In 1613 he gained his B.A. from Jesus College, Oxford. He was the first writer to earn his living solely from writing in the English language. He was also the first writer of an epistolary novel, a novel of letters, in English (this book, "Familiar Letters"). Howell's "Proverbs" (1659), contains probably his most famous quote; "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." Most of this work was written while Howell was in Fleet Prison during the1640s, and reflects on his earlier travels from 1616 on behalf of a London glass factory. The work was originally published in three volumes over the course of five years, with a fourth volume added in a collected 1655 edition. This edition is all four volumes published as one, with continuous pagination. With an engraved, fold-out frontispiece. This is the fourth edition, the profits of which went towards funding Guy's Hospital, London. Light wear at edges, small separations at front hinge but holding well, otherwise fine; paper supple, unmarked, tight, square, and clean. VERY GOOD. 12mo 7" - 7½" tall. 510, (24) pp. Very Good with No dust jacket as issued .

Keywords: Letters; Correspondence; Novels; Leather; Fine Binding; Novels, Poetry & Literature Fiction Rare, Antiquarian, and Collectible Books


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