Charles Dickens

A set of the Nonesuch Press edition of the works of Charles Dickens.

• Sold as a set of 25 volumes.
• Charles Dickens (English).
• Edited by Arthur Waugh [and others].
• London: The Nonesuch Press, 1937-38.
• Large octavo.
• Nonesuch edition, number 433 of 877 limited sets.
• With illustrations printed from the original plates.
• With the original steel plate 'Fagin in the condemned Cell' from Oliver Twist, with a letter of authenticity from the publisher.
• Text based upon the Charles Dickens Edition, the last to be revised by Dickens himself.
• Publisher's vari-colored cloth, morocco labels, top edges gilt on the rough, others uncut.

After the Depression of the early thirties, the Nonesuch Press was effectively saved from bankruptcy by the intervention of the American, George Macy. 'The Dickens' set was very much his project and it was due to his great energy that it was produced so quickly. It was described at the time by the Daily Telegraph as 'one of the most glorious achievements of publishing in our time. Robert Lynd in the News Chronicle declared it the most pleasant Dickens to read that has ever been published, while The Scotsman observed: No more handsome edition of Dickens has yet appeared; nor is it easy to conceive of any which might surpass this one.'