The manuscript for "An apology for a Preface" - photo 1
The manuscript for "An apology for a Preface" - photo 2

The manuscript for "An apology for a Preface"

Lot 270
16.06.2023 10:00UTC -04:00
Classic
Starting price
$ 100
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUSA, New York
Archive
The auction is completed. No bids can be placed anymore.
Archive
ID 967470
Lot 270 | The manuscript for "An apology for a Preface"
Estimate value
$ 1 500 – 3 000
LOWELL, James Russell (1819-1891). Autograph manuscript signed ("J. R. Lowell"), "An Apology for a Preface," Westminster, ca 17 October 1888].

Five pages, 177 x 114mm, with numerous corrections and emendations in his hand (contemporary ink smudge to title, mild toning at left margin and verso of final leaf).

Lowell's original manuscript for "An Apology for a Preface," which appeared as (not surprisingly) a preface in his volume of collected lectures, The English Poets,. The Camelot Series in 1888. Headed "Let me see proofs," the manuscript bears several corrections in Lowell's hand, but in large part matches the final published version, and to an extent can be summed up by the following passage where he rightly observes that "all prefaces may be said to have one valid excuse for being—namely, that the judicious reader can, and generally does, skip them, thus securing one pleasurable emotion at least from his book—a success beyond the average, if I may trust my own experience. And yet, feeling as I do my incompetence for this species of literature, in which I have no more practice than one has in dying, having written but one in my life, I see no great harm in doing … what I had rather not do at all…."

[With:] Autograph letter signed ("J. R. Lowell") [London,] Westminster, Two pages, bifolium, 177 x 114mm (mild toning at left margin). With original transmittal envelope addressed in his hand. Lowell's letter of enclosure for his "Apology": "I send back the Ms. as you wish. I have corrected a clip[?] or two here & there, for I was so hurried in order to keep my word with you that I did not read it over after writing it."
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