first edition
1832 · Philadelphia
by Austen, Jane; [Rébora, Sol]
Philadelphia: Carey & Lea, 1832. First printing. Near fine.. First US edition in a stunning fine art binding by the acclaimed Argentinian design bookbinder Sol Rébora. Austen's most beloved novel is simultaneously a unique production of profound artistic confidence and an entertaining popular love story: it builds on a long-established tradition of English courtship novels in conversation with many women authors before her like Frances Burney (from whose book CECILIA Austen may have borrowed the very phrase "pride and prejudice"). Austen admitted in a letter that she thought her book's heroine, Elizabeth Bennett, "as delightful a creature as ever (truncated)