The Tatler; or, Lucubrations of Isaac Bickerstaff, Esq; Volumes One Through Four

by Isaac Bickerstaff [Richard Steele; Joseph Addison] 

Four volumes.  London:  Jacob and Richard Tonson, 1759  

Leatherbound set is overall in VERY GOOD+ condition.

• Polished calf covers with gilt ornament to edges and spine, black and red labels with gilt text. 
• Boards show some wear, smudges, stains, scuffing, edgewear.  Corners are worn, with exposed board.  See photos.  
• Spines have gilt text and are a little worn, with chipped ends.  See photos.
• Bindings are secure, boards of Volume I are a little tender. 
• Pastedowns and feps are toned, have some light foxing, owner's mark to pastedown Volume IV.
• Frontispieces are present in each volume; offsetting between frontis and title page.  See photos.  
• Interiors are gently age-toned, exhibit some smudges, turned in corners in Vol. II.  See photos.  
• Inside pages are free of writing and intentional marks. 
• PS2026.0903

1870 pages plus Index. 5 x 8 1/8 inches

Four-volume edition, 1759.  Original bindings of polished calf, with gilt to all edges, ornamented segmented spines, red and black labels with gilt titles.  Collected reprint of the literary and social periodical which ran between 1709 and 1711.  Very Good Plus original condition, with crisp interiors, just a little foxing to first and last sheets of each volume.  Boards show some age at edges.  A handsome set of this attractive edition.

Written under the pseudonym Isaac Bickerstaff, Esq., The Tatler was founded and largely written by Richard Steele, with contributions from Joseph Addison and Jonathan Swift.  It represented a new approach to journalism, featuring cultivated essays on contemporary matters and establishing a pattern that would be copied in The Spectator, The Rambler, and The Idler.

The four frontispieces are the work of Francis Hayman (1708–1776), an influential 18th-c. English painter, illustrator, and a founding member of the Royal Academy of Arts.  

An interesting association for this set.  The pastedown to Volume IV bears the penciled  inscription:  "Sarah E Cresson Dickie, March 1855."  Sarah Emlen Cresson, from a wealthy Quaker family, married the Rev. John Miller Dickey (1806-1878), a Presbyterian minister, in 1824.  Together in 1854 they founded the Ashmun Institute in Philadelphia, the first degree-granting HBCU in America.  In 1866, Ashmun was renamed Lincoln University, which name it has kept to the present day.  

Please see photos. More photos available upon request.

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