The Pupil of Pleasure: or, the New System Illustrated. Inscribed to Mrs. Eugenia Stanhope, Editor of Lord Chesterfield's Letters
by Melmoth, Courtney (Pratt, Samuel Jackson)
- Used
- first
- Condition
- See description
- Seller
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Brooklyn, New York, United States
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About This Item
London: Printed for G. Robinson, and J. Bew, in Pater-Noster-Row, 1776. First edition of this epistolary novel, published two years after the posthumous appearance of Lord Chesterfield's Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman. In that controversial bestseller, Chesterfield advises his son to cultivate an open, inviting manner while steadily advancing his own interests: "take great care that the first impressions you give of yourself may be not only favorable, but pleasing, engaging, nay, seducing." Samuel Johnson remarked that Chesterfield's letters "teach the morals of a whore and the manners of a dancing-master." Philip Sedley, the apt young hero of Pupil of Pleasure, takes "the divine Letters" as his gospel, moving to the spa town of Buxton to practice his pleasing, engaging, and seducing: "what our Garrick is to Shakespeare, I am resolved to be to Chesterfield - the living comment upon the dead text." But what begins as a comic novel, featuring a naïve clergyman and his easily dazzled young wife, turns into a much darker cautionary tale, as Sedley sinks into real brutality and destroys multiple lives in his pursuit of pleasure. In justice to Chesterfield, one witness to Sedley's fall observes that he "purposely pillaged the volume for the pernicious, and rejected the instructive." Former clergyman Samuel Jackson Pratt (1749-1814), who wrote and acted under the pseudonym Courtney Melmoth, himself faced lifelong skepticism regarding his dubious marriage, finances, and morals. The frustrated fantasy of disarming his critics and triumphing over them animates Sedley's character. OCLC locates ten holdings of this first edition worldwide, six in the United States: Harvard, Huntington, Newberry, Penn, Princeton, and Yale. A very good copy of a fascinating fictional critique. Two twelvemo volumes, measuring 6.5 x 4 inches: xv, [1], 230; [4], 252. Contemporary half-calf, spines ruled and numbered in gilt, red morocco spine labels, pale blue marbled boards with vellum corners. Early book labels of Thomas Hammond Foxcroft to pastedowns, Foxcroft's signature to both titles, additional early ink signatures to half-titles. Light shelfwear to bindings, final three leaves of Volume II with short scored cuts (no loss).
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Details
- Bookseller
- Honey & Wax Booksellers (US)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 1003071
- Title
- The Pupil of Pleasure: or, the New System Illustrated. Inscribed to Mrs. Eugenia Stanhope, Editor of Lord Chesterfield's Letters
- Author
- Melmoth, Courtney (Pratt, Samuel Jackson)
- Book Condition
- Used
- Quantity Available
- 1
- Publisher
- Printed for G. Robinson, and J. Bew, in Pater-Noster-Row
- Place of Publication
- London
- Date Published
- 1776
- Weight
- 0.00 lbs
- Keywords
- literature, fiction, education
Terms of Sale
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About the Seller
Honey & Wax Booksellers
Biblio member since 2015
Brooklyn, New York
About Honey & Wax Booksellers
Honey & Wax offers a mix of classics and surprises: rare first printings, original artwork, unexpected survivals, books with no downloadable equivalent. Founders of the Honey & Wax Book Collecting Prize. Our bookroom is open by appointment in Brooklyn, NY.
Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- Leaves
- Very generally, "leaves" refers to the pages of a book, as in the common phrase, "loose-leaf pages." A leaf is a single sheet...
- Gilt
- The decorative application of gold or gold coloring to a portion of a book on the spine, edges of the text block, or an inlay in...
- Marbled boards
- ...
- Morocco
- Morocco is a style of leather book binding that is usually made with goatskin, as it is durable and easy to dye. (see also...
- G
- Good describes the average used and worn book that has all pages or leaves present. Any defects must be noted. (as defined by AB...
- First Edition
- In book collecting, the first edition is the earliest published form of a book. A book may have more than one first edition in...
- Spine
- The outer portion of a book which covers the actual binding. The spine usually faces outward when a book is placed on a shelf....
- Vellum
- Vellum is a sheet of specialty prepared skin of lamb, calf, or goat kid used for binding a book or for printing and writing. ...
- Shelfwear
- Minor wear resulting from a book being place on, and taken from a bookshelf, especially along the bottom edge.
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