[PRESENTATION BY THE ILLUSTRATOR] RETURN OF THE NATIVE

Thomas Hardy | Clare Leighton (Illustrator)

New York & London: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1929.

Hard Cover. Limited Edition. Signed. 8vo; in the publisher’s blue paper-covered boards, backed in linen; with paper spine lable, with dustjacket, and with the original glassine wrapper; x, xi-xiii; [2], 3-484, [485]; with 12 tipped in woodcuts and with numerous textual illustrations; the edition is limited to 1500 copies, of which this is #920, signed by the illustrator, Clare Leighton.~~This copy also inscribed by illustrator Clare Leighton to her then lover, Henry Noel Brailsford. Ms. Leighton provided the woodcut frontispiece and decorations for this book. Noel Brailsford is considered to be the most prolific British left-wing journalist of the first half of the 20th century, and was one of the founders of the Men’s League for Women’s Suffage [see wiki]. Mr. Brailslford and Clare Leighton lived together for nearly a decade starting in 1928; he was still married to his first wife, and she denied him a divorce. In 1939 Ms. Leighton left England to reside permanently in the United State; she never married.~~The presentation from Clare Leighton: “To Noel who with the third Rasoumowsky and Tadnol [sic] helped be to do this. C. L. New York February 1929”.

Very Good binding / Very Good dust jacket.
Item #296255

Price: $650.00