[MALORY, SIR THOMAS]. The Birth Life and Acts of King Arthur of his Noble Knights of the Round Table Their Marvellous Enquests and Adventures the Achieving of the San Greal and in the End Le Morte Darthur With the Dolourous Death and Departing out of this World of Them All. The Text as Written by Sir Thomas Malory and Imprinted by William Caxton at Westminster the Year MCCCCLXXXV [1485] and now Spelled in Modern Style, Embellished With Many Original Designs by Aubrey Beardsley. [London]: J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd., MDCCCXCIII [-MDCCCXCIV] [1893-1894].
FIRST EDITION THUS. In two volumes; leather-bound; hardcover; large octavo (24.5 x 19.5 cm); pp. [9], x-lxiv, [1], 2-455, [1]; [8], lxv-xc, [1], 458-990, [2]. English text, with illustrations throughout by Aubrey Beardsley. Handsomely rebound in half morocco gilt; cloth sides; top edges gilt; marbled endpapers; photogravure frontispieces; 18 wood-engraved plates (5 double-page); numerous illustrations within text, borders and historiated initials. Condition: NEAR FINE. Bindings tight and secure, the hinges and joints perfectly intact. Covers very well-preserved. Very few trivial fox spots. Without previous ownership markings. A most handsome set.
Notes: The famous first Beardsley edition, one of 1,500 copies on ordinary paper, of a total edition of 1,800 copies, here beautifully rebound in contemporary half morocco, with attractive gilt ruling and tooling to the spine. This was Aubrey Beardsley's first major commission and the book that launched the "Beardsley look" (Gillon, p. iv). In 1892, seeking to emulate the books of the Kelmscott Press, John M. Dent commissioned the 20-year-old Beardsley to produce this edition, a project that took the artist 18 months to complete. "In Le Morte d'Arthur Beardsley learnt his job, but the result is no bungling student's work. If he had never illustrated another book, this edition of Morte d'Arthur could stand as a monument of decorative book illustration" (Lewis, pp. 148-9). The work was first published, to notable controversy, in 12 monthly magazine instalments between June 1893 and mid-1894. "Often shockingly overt in their sexuality and eroticism, the illustrations rejected the aesthetic of the Pre-Raphaelites who were Beardsley's original mentors and offered a revisionist and parodic treatment of their medievalism. Ultimately, Beardsley went far beyond his original intention to 'flabbergast the bourgeois' of his day; he also challenged generations of readers and artists to view Arthurian society through his own modernist lens" (Lupack, pp. 75-91). The work was issued by subscription in 12 parts between June 1893 and November 1894 in an edition of 1,500 copies on standard paper, as here, and 300 copies on Van Gelder paper. Edmund Vincent Gillon, Illustrations for Le Morte D'Arthur, 1972; Barbara Tepa Lupack, Illustrating Camelot, 2008; John Lewis, The Twentieth Century Book, 1984.
