The Sphinx
Elkin Mathews & John Lane at the Bodley Head, 1894.
First edition. One of 200 (from a total edition of 225 copies). Original vellum with a gilt decorated design by Charles Ricketts. Nine dramatic, full page wood cut illustrations by Ricketts printed in sepia, initial letters and catch words printed in green. A very near fine copy, with the vellum unusually fresh and just a couple of small spots to the upper cover. Internally also very fresh, with a marked lack of the scattered foxing to which this book is particularly prone. Bookplate to the front pastedown. An exceptionally nice copy.
Wilde's phantasmagorical lyric poem, which he began as an undergraduate influenced by the works of Baudelaire and Flaubert. It is described as "a prime example of many aspects of the English literary Decadence, an extravagant example in both style and subject matter of the ornate become outré, the esoteric entering the forbidden, the luxurious growing lascivious." (Jerome Buckley - Oecho and Artifice: The Poetry of Oscar Wilde)
The book is, however, as notable for being one of the most pre-eminent late nineteenth century book productions as it is for its text.
"Wilde requested Ricketts to design this first edition of The Sphinx, and it is the first book over which he [Ricketts] exercised complete control of illustration, page, and binding design. His use of a pictorial title, placed on a verso like a frontispiece, was to continue in many of his later publications" (The Turn of the Century)
It is regarded as Ricketts's best work as an illustrator, the Pall Mall Gazette remarking in a contemporary review, "the monsters of the Egyptian room at the British Museum live again in weird, sometimes repulsive, but at all times stately and impressive lines."
Mason 362, Turn of a Century 10.
Stock ID: 42692
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