Some Tame Gazelle.
by PYM, Barbara
- Used
- Hardcover
- Signed
- first
- Condition
- See description
- Seller
-
London, United Kingdom
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
London: Jonathan Cape,, 1950. A rare signed copy of the author's debut novel First edition, second impression, inscribed by the author on the front free endpaper, "with best wishes, from Barbara Pym, 11.2.51". Pym began her roman-à-clef on graduating from St Hilda's College, Oxford, in 1934. As her first published novel, it "established a pattern" for her later work, with "its dry humour and irony, its concentration on middle-aged spinsters, clergy, and the detail of deeply unfashionable lives" (Orlando). At Oxford, Pym devoted herself to her twin passions of English poetry and the Church of England, and encountered her third passion, Henry Harvey, a fellow undergraduate who served as the model for Henry Hoccleve. While her diary records that she and Hoccleve did have a romance of sorts, he was largely distant and uninterested. Writing Some Tame Gazelle was partly Pym's attempt to "get a handle on a distressing love affair" (Huneven). She populated the book with herself, her sister, and their circle of friends, imagined as middle-aged, affording her "some comic distance [from] this disappointing interlude" (ibid.). In a review, Antonia White wrote "Miss Pym, working in petit point, makes each stitch with perfect precision"; she "will almost certainly be compared to Jane Austen and very possibly to Trollope" (p. 21). Another contemporary review suggested comparison with Elizabeth Gaskell. Octavo. Original light brown cloth, spine and front cover lettered in blue. With dust jacket. Spine cocked, ends worn, outer leaves gently foxed, else clean; jacket spine panel toned, slight loss at head of spine not affecting text, edges chipped and creased, rear panel discoloured, unclipped: a very good copy in like jacket. Michelle Huneven, "Love In Her Own Peculiar Way: Barbara Pym, Useless Longings, and Some Tame Gazelle", Barbara Pym Society, available online; Antonia White, "New Novels", The New Statesman and Nation, 1 July 1950.
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Details
- Bookseller
- Peter Harrington (GB)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 170015
- Title
- Some Tame Gazelle.
- Author
- PYM, Barbara
- Book Condition
- Used
- Binding
- Hardcover
- Place of Publication
- London: Jonathan Cape,
- Date Published
- 1950
Terms of Sale
Peter Harrington
All major credit cards are accepted. Both UK pounds and US dollars (exchange rate to be agreed) accepted. Books may be returned within 14 days of receipt for any reason, please notify first of returned goods.
About the Seller
Peter Harrington
Biblio member since 2006
London
About Peter Harrington
Since its establishment, Peter Harrington has specialised in sourcing, selling and buying the finest quality original first editions, signed, rare and antiquarian books, fine bindings and library sets. Peter Harrington first began selling rare books from the Chelsea Antiques Market on London's King's Road. For the past twenty years the business has been run by Pom Harrington, Peter's son.
Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- 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...
- Cloth
- "Cloth-bound" generally refers to a hardcover book with cloth covering the outside of the book covers. The cloth is stretched...
- Foxed
- Foxing is the age related browning, or brown-yellowish spots, that can occur to book paper over time. When this aging process...
- Edges
- The collective of the top, fore and bottom edges of the text block of the book, being that part of the edges of the pages of a...
- Octavo
- Another of the terms referring to page or book size, octavo refers to a standard printer's sheet folded four times, producing...
- Inscribed
- When a book is described as being inscribed, it indicates that a short note written by the author or a previous owner has been...
- 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...
- 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....
- Cocked
- Refers to a state where the spine of a book is lightly "twisted" in such a way that the front and rear boards of a book do not...
- Jacket
- Sometimes used as another term for dust jacket, a protective and often decorative wrapper, usually made of paper which wraps...
- New
- A new book is a book previously not circulated to a buyer. Although a new book is typically free of any faults or defects, "new"...