BATTLE-PIECES and Aspects of The War
- 1866
1866. [one of Melville's scarcest] New York: Harper & Brothers, 1866. Original violet cloth, beveled board edges.
First Edition of Melville's first published volume of verse, about the just-concluded American Civil War -- "dedicated to the memory of the Three Hundred Thousand who in the war for the maintenance of the Union fell devotedly under the flag of their fathers." In 1857 Melville stopped writing fiction after the publication of THE CONFIDENCE-MAN -- though he would live 34 additional years; discouraged by the lack of critical acclaim, he turned instead to verse, to which he had originally aspired. Three years later (1860) he submitted some poems to Harper, but his proposed volume was rejected, and those poems today are lost. Five years after that, spurred on by the fall of Richmond, he wrote the 72 poems that comprise BATTLE-PIECES -- the first section of 50+ describing the war chronologically, event by event, and the second section consisting of elegies, epitaphs, and requiems. His introductory poem "The Portent" (not cited in the Contents) covers the hanging of John Brown in 1859; two poems after "The Surrender at Appomattox" is "The Martyr," the assassination of Lincoln. Throughout, Melville describes not the glory of the war but the horror and the tragedy of the war. As Blanck notes, all copies bear the misprint "hnndred" on the copyright page (it is small print and the letters "u" and "n" are very similar, so a myth has evolved that there are two states). This copy is bound in textured violet cloth (Blanck's "red-purple C-like cloth," one of seven possibilities of cloth grain and color (no precedence). Condition is very good (slight wear at the spine ends and two small dents in the spine; spine a little sunned as always with this color; front endpaper cracked but tight). This is one of Melville's scarcer titles; one can well imagine that Harper printed comparatively few copies of Melville's second attempt at verse, having rejected his first attempt outright. Blanck 13673. Provenance: bookplates of [Dr.] Walter Ralph Steiner (1870-1942) and of [Prof.] Joseph Vincent Ridgely (1921-2014).
First Edition of Melville's first published volume of verse, about the just-concluded American Civil War -- "dedicated to the memory of the Three Hundred Thousand who in the war for the maintenance of the Union fell devotedly under the flag of their fathers." In 1857 Melville stopped writing fiction after the publication of THE CONFIDENCE-MAN -- though he would live 34 additional years; discouraged by the lack of critical acclaim, he turned instead to verse, to which he had originally aspired. Three years later (1860) he submitted some poems to Harper, but his proposed volume was rejected, and those poems today are lost. Five years after that, spurred on by the fall of Richmond, he wrote the 72 poems that comprise BATTLE-PIECES -- the first section of 50+ describing the war chronologically, event by event, and the second section consisting of elegies, epitaphs, and requiems. His introductory poem "The Portent" (not cited in the Contents) covers the hanging of John Brown in 1859; two poems after "The Surrender at Appomattox" is "The Martyr," the assassination of Lincoln. Throughout, Melville describes not the glory of the war but the horror and the tragedy of the war. As Blanck notes, all copies bear the misprint "hnndred" on the copyright page (it is small print and the letters "u" and "n" are very similar, so a myth has evolved that there are two states). This copy is bound in textured violet cloth (Blanck's "red-purple C-like cloth," one of seven possibilities of cloth grain and color (no precedence). Condition is very good (slight wear at the spine ends and two small dents in the spine; spine a little sunned as always with this color; front endpaper cracked but tight). This is one of Melville's scarcer titles; one can well imagine that Harper printed comparatively few copies of Melville's second attempt at verse, having rejected his first attempt outright. Blanck 13673. Provenance: bookplates of [Dr.] Walter Ralph Steiner (1870-1942) and of [Prof.] Joseph Vincent Ridgely (1921-2014).
Details
Title
BATTLE-PIECES and Aspects of The War
Author
Melville, Herman
Condition
Unknown
Date
1866