First edition. Three volumes. Original cinnamon cloth lettered in gilt to the spines and decorated in blind to the boards. Author's presentation copy, inscribed to one of her closest friends, Barbara Bodichon, "To Barbara L. S. Bodichon, the friend who first recognized me in this book. I give it as a remembrance of the moment when she cheered one by that recognition and her joy in it. / George Eliot / July 7. 1859." A near fine set, bright and crisp with just a trace of wear to a couple of corners. Internally fine with all hinges perfect.

An exceptional and rare presentation copy of Eliot's first full-length novel, inscribed to her close friend, the noted feminist, educationalist and women's rights activist, Barbara Bodichon, author of the influential 'Brief Summary of the Laws of England concerning Women' (1854) and co-founder of the first women's college at Cambridge, Girton College in 1869.
Eliot met Bodichon in the summer of 1852, through the circle of friends surrounding the Westmister Review, which was owned by John Chapman and anonymously edited by Eliot. The two women became close and lifelong friends, so much so that on Eliot's death in 1881, her biographer John Cross wrote to Bodichon seeking material and saying, "Amongst all her intimate friends I know there was none she valued more or who was more to her than yourself."
Evidence of their closeness can be seen in the publication of Adam Bede. It was published in February 1859, whilst Bodichon was wintering in Algiers. Having read some excerpts from the book in an English newspaper review, she immediately recognised it as the work of her friend and wrote triumphantly to Eliot, "I have not yet got the book but I know that it is you... not because it is like what you have written before but because it is like what I see in you... there is her great big head and heart and her wise wide views'" (Letters, III 56-7).
Eliot responded, "God bless you, dearest Barbara, for your love and sympathy. You are the first friend who has given any symptom of knowing me—the first heart that has recognized me in a book which has come from my heart of hearts", and she asks Bodichon "to keep the secrets solemnly till I give you leave to tell it, and give way to no impulses of triumphant affection" (Letters, III 63).
On Bodichon's return to England, in recognition of both her friendship and her perspicacity, Eliot presented her with this inscribed copy of the novel.
It would appear that this was an act that Eliot seldom partook of, so presentation copies of her works are virtually unknown with a total of a mere seven examples (of all titles) offered at auction in the last century and no other examples of Adam Bede.
Laid in is an autograph letter from Barbara Bodichon signed ("B.L.S.B."), to "My dearest Aunt Patty," written from Algiers, 29 November [1859],discussing family and literary matters. In the letter she discusses the authorship of Adam Bede: "I never knew she had written fiction... yet I know Adam Bede was by her - for in it I saw her peculiar & surpassing tenderness & wisdom. I know no one so learned & tender & delicate."

PROVENANCE: Barbara Bodichon (presentation inscription, and her address stamp on half-titles); passed down by family descent, then sold at Sotheby's 1966; William E. Stockhausen (his sale, Sotheby Parke Bernet, 1974).

Baker & Ross A4.1(A); Sadleir 812

Stock ID: 45456