BELL, John (1745-1831, Editor, Publisher)

Bell's Edition of the Poets of Great Britain. Complete from Chaucer to Churchill. [Traveling Library]

London; Edinburgh: Printed for John Bell, near Exeter Exchange, Strand; Apollo Press, 1776-1783. 109 Volumes. 12mo. (4 4/5 x 2 4/5 inches). Each volume with an engraved volume title and many with engraved author portrait frontispieces. As usual with Bell, the volume title pages and volume interiors are often printed in different years, and in varying locales.

Contemporary tree calf uniform across set, paneled with gilt Greek key scroll, gilt-patterned board edges and dentelles, gilt spine in six compartments with red morocco letter-pieces in second and sixth compartments, dark green lettering-piece in fourth, volume numbers in sixth compartments, stone-patterned marbled endpapers, on laid paper, all edges stained yellow, with red silk ribbons. Occasional wear to binding and minor damp stains to end papers of two books

A charming, evocative traveling library from the period of the Grand Tour with 109 attractive uniform volumes.

Bell, a pioneering bookseller, printer, and editor, published The Poets of Great Britain from 1777 to 1783. His innovative publishing model, which included repackaging remaindered texts with new cancel titles, inserting beautiful engravings, and using well-done uniform bindings across his sets, brought the luminaries of English literatures to the masses without sacrificing quality or appeal. Bell's series also reflects a broader shift in eighteenth-century literary publishing, in which the collected edition became a carefully designed object as well as a reading text. The engraved portraits and title-pages gave visual identity to the poets, while the uniform small-format volumes turned English literary history into a coherent private library. The series gathers a broad canon of English poetry, from Chaucer, Spenser, Milton, Dryden, Swift, and Pope to major eighteenth-century voices such as Gay, Thomson, Gray, and Churchill. Its range is central to its appeal: Bell presents the early masters of English verse alongside Restoration, Augustan, and eighteenth-century poets in a compact, uniform library, making the set both a practical reading collection and a carefully designed survey of British literary history for an expanding reading public. The full list of authors is available upon request.

Bonnell, The Most Disreputable Trade: Publishing the Classics of English Poetry, 1765-1810, pp. 97-133. DNB.

Item #41697

Price: $7,500.00