[Rarebooks] fa: RICHARD CUMBERLAND - A VOLUME OF COMEDIES, viz. The West Indian, &c. - Perth: 1791

[Ardwight Chamberlain]

Listed now, auctions ending Sunday, October 11. More details and images can be found at the URL below or by searching for the seller name arch_in_la.

http://tinyurl.com/o52x67t

Thanks,
Ardwight Chamberlain


Richard Cumberland: A Volume of Comedies: viz. The Fashionable Lover, The West Indian, and The Brothers. Perth: Printed by R. Morison junior, for R. Morison and Son, Booksellers, Perth, MDCCXCI [1791]. Modern paper-covered boards with printed spine label; 12mo (15.5 cm); [2], 69, [1]; [2], 79, [3]; [2], 65, [1] pp. ESTC T18510.

Unusual provincial/Scottish edition of Richard Cumberland's most successful plays. Cumberland (1732-1811) was a civil servant in the Board of Trade and Plantations as well as a prolific writer estimated to have produced more than fifty plays, the best known of which are The Fashionable Lover, The Brothers, and The West Indian, the latter generally being considered his masterpiece. Its hero, a young scapegrace and would-be libertine fresh from the West Indies "with rum and sugar enough belonging to him to make all the water in the Thames into punch," falls in love with the daughter of an impecunious major, and intrigue, misidentification, missing jewels, a duel, and general hilarity ensue.

Very uncommon: ESCT locates this Perth edition in only 5 institutions worldwide (NL of Scotland, BL, Oxford, Brown, U of Illinois). First and last several leaves with bumping and some soiling to the fore-corners, a few other leaves with corner creases, a few light spots here and there, otherwise clean and sound, firmly bound.