International Women's Day 2018 - Henry Sotheran's
←
→
Page content transcription
If your browser does not render page correctly, please read the page content below
SOTHERAN’S OF SACKVILLE STREET PRESENTS
A CATALOGUE OF CURIOSITIES
IN CONJUNCTION WITH:
International Women’s Day
2018
Henry Sotheran Ltd books@sotherans.co.uk
2-5 Sackville Street
London 02074 396151
W1s 3DP www.sotherans.co.uk
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 1
To coincide with International Women’s Day 2018, we are pleased to present a catalogue of
books covering a vast array of topics ranging from politics through to travel pioneers. As
you can imagine, the pool of material to choose from is intimidatingly large and so we’ve
selected those items we feel display some particular curiosity of provenance or quirk of
character, with a few classics thrown in for good measure. If you have any questions about
the titles presented here please contact books@sotherans.co.uk
1 - Women at Work, Home & Play
2 - Women in Politics
3 - Women Travellers
4 - Women Writers
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 2
“We have to free half of the human race, the women,
so that they can help to free the other half.”
1. PANKHURST, E Sylvia (author). The Suffragette. The History of the Women’s Militant Suffrage
Movement 1905-1910. London; Gay & Hancock Limited. 1911. £1,450
8vo. Original lilac-grey cloth lettered gilt to spine with device to upper board in gilt, white and green and
lettering in white; pp. [xvi], 3-517; with frontispiece and 31 other photographic plates; a good, sound copy
with a lean and overall dust-soiling; considerable rubbing to joints, edges, and spine ends with wear to head
and heel; bruising to extremities, and wear to lower forecorner; internally sound with only a little occasional
cracking; toning to text stock (as usual); ghosting from the important ink inscriptions on front free endpaper
to the following offset blank; rucking to upper forecorner of final 50 pages and mild foxing to frontispiece
tissue.
Second edition, published just one month after the first (in June). An important association copy bearing
the ownership inscription of Elsie Lagsding, 4 Carter Terrace, Poplar to front free endpaper, followed by
the signature of the author, Emmeline Pankhurst (“E. Sylvia Pankhurst”) and the tag “Votes for Women” in
Pankhurst’s hand.
A history of the “Women’s Suffrage agitation” written before the outcome of the battle was known, but in a
spirit of optimism that later generations would “wonder at the blindness that led the Government of the day
to obstinately resist so simple and obvious a measure of justice”. Elsie Lagsding was a member of the East
London Federation of Suffragettes: an association founded by Pankhurst.
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 3
WOMEN AT HOME, WORK & PLAY
2 A.R.D. Letters to my Boys. London, [Wertheimer, Lea
and Co.], 1897. £245
Small 8vo. Original graphite cloth, front cover lettered in gilt;
pp. [x], 70; occasional faint spotting, a very good copy.
Extremely rare, privately printed first edition. These letters,
edifying religiously and morally, were written by a Jewish
mother to her sons ‘when they were unavoidably prevented
from coming home from school for our usual weekly service
and the Bible talks we invariably held afterwards’ (Preface).
The only other copy we were able to locate is at UCL, and we
were unable to lift the veil of anonymity.
3 Anon. Queen Mary’s Army Auxiliary Corps. Orig-
inal lithograph in colours, linen backed, printed in the U.K,
c.1917. 730 x 492 mm. £710
4 CURIE, Eve. Madame Curie. Paris: Gallimard. 1938.
£200
8vo. Sometime rebound in cream paper-backed red marbled
boards, gilt morocco lettering pieces to spine, patterned sand-
papers; pp. 313, frontispiece portrait of Marie Curie; previous
owner’s inscription to flyleaf, edges slightly browned, very good.
First French trade edition, printed a year after first limited edi-
tion. Text in French. Eve Curie’s biography of her mother was
an enormous hit and was adapted in to a film in 1943, starring
Greer Garson.
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 4
5 [QUAKER.] FELL, Sarah. The Household Account
Book of Sarah Fell. Edited by Norman Penney. Cambridge, At
The University Press, 1920. £ 68
Royal 8vo. (250 x 165 mm). Publisher’s quarter linen over
grey paper-covered boards, paper label to the spine, lacking
dust jacket; pp. xxxii, 597, [1]; light spotting to the fore edges,
some light browning to the front and rear free endpapers, else
a bright copy.
First edition. The first appearance in print of the full manu-
script of the household account book of Sarah Fell, the eldest
daughter of Margaret Fell of Swarthmoor Hall near Ulverston,
who following the death of her first husband, married the
founder of the Quakers, George Fox. Written between Sep-
tember 1673 and August 1678, the manuscript remained at
Swarthmoor until the sale of the estate in 1759 when the con-
tents were divided among the family. It subsequently belonged
to a Lancaster grocer, who was apparently starting to use it as
wrapping paper, before it was rescued, eventually finding an
appropriate home in the Library of the Society of Friends in
London.
6 DR. GREGORY. A Father’s Legacy to His Daughters. John Sharpe. 1822.. £150
12mo. Contemporary binding by Cruickshank of Liverpool in full blue calf, blind-stamped panel with ornate
gilt border to sides, spine with gilt raised bands, centre tools and lettering, gilt turn-ins, a.e.g. ; pp. viii + 160;
copper-engraved title and 4 other engraved plate; spine rubbed, foxing to plates, otherwise clean, very good.
7 HAYES, Alice M. The Horsewoman. A practical guide
to side-saddle riding and hunting. Hurst and Blackett Ltd.
1910. £160
8vo. Original red cloth, gilt lettering to upper board and
spine; pp. xvi + 534 + [ii, ads.], photographic illustrations
throughout; previous owner’s signature to front pastedown,
very good.
Third edition.
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 5
8 JEFFERYS, Thomas. Demoiselle Francoise. Original
engraving with hand colour illustrating the Habit of a Lady
of Quality in France, as published in Thomas Jefferys, A
Collection of the Dresses of Different Nations, 1757. 327 x
236 mm. £ 95
9 JENKINS, Hester Donaldson. Behind Turkish Lattices.
The Story of a Turkish Woman’s Life. Philadelphia, Lippincott,
1911. £398
8vo. Original green cloth, lettered in gilt, top edge gilt, illus-
trated in white and gilt; pp. ix, 179, frontispiece and numerous
plates after photographs; minimal rubbing to cloth, text a little
brown-spotted, otherwise very good.
First edition of a scarce and important title. ‘Hester Donaldson
Jenkins (1869-1941), a professor at the American College for
Girls in Constantinople from 1900-1909, wrote enthusiasti-
cally about the Young Turks, who in 1908 established a con-
stitutional monarchy in the Ottoman Empire. They seemed to
Jenkins to promise new freedoms for Ottoman women. In this
book Jenkins uses her own observations of Constantinople,
her students, and their families to construct an account of a
typical Turkish Muslim womans life cycle at this turning point
in Ottoman history. She intends her comments on childhood,
education, marriage, polygamy, and divorce to correct Western
misapprehensions and she notes how Ottoman women selec-
tively adopted Western customs, such as European clothing,
and increasingly practiced monogamy. Jenkins’ corrective is
only partial, however, for she describes Turkish women as
childishly charming but sadly ignorant and in need of the up-
lifting influences of Western education. In its confidence in the
bright prospects of American influence and Ottoman reform,
this book captures an optimistic moment in which social prog-
ress seemed to prevail against the looming social and ethnic
divisions of the Balkan and First World Wars’ (blurb from a
modern re-edition).
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 6
10 JESSUP, Henry Harris. The Women of the Arabs. New York, Dodd & Mead, [1873]. £895 8vo. Original rust cloth, lettered and decorated in black and gilt; pp. x, 371, wood-engraved plates with tissue guards; very light marking and bubbling to cloth, evenly a little toned as usual, a few pages and plates a little brown-spotted; ownership inscription to front paste-down; a very good copy. First edition, very rare. Probably one of the earliest work dealing with the role of women in society and female education in and around Lebanon and Syria. ‘Following his graduation from Union Theological Seminary and his subsequent ordination to the ministry of the Presbyterian Church in the USA, Henry Harris Jessup was appointed as a missionary to Syria in 1855 by the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. In 1870, when the Syria Mission was transferred from the ABCFM to the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions, he thereafter served the latter. Until 1860, Jessup resided in Tripoli with his family, but spent the remainder of his missionary service in Beirut where for thirty years he was acting pastor of the Syrian Church of Beirut and superintendent of its school. He also served as secretary of the Asfuriyeh Hospital for the Insane from its establishment and as a missionary editor of the Arabic Journal, El Nesrah. In 1866, Jessup helped found the Syrian Protestant College, now the American University of Beirut. Besides serving as moderator of the 1879 General Assembly, Jessup authored several works about his mission experience in Syria. He died in service and was buried in Beirut’ (Presbyterian Historical Society, online). His autobiography, Fifty Three Years in Syria of 1910 is equally rare, i.e. I can’t find it at all. Smith J21 (‘an authoritative work by a long-time missionary to Syria’). HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 7
11 MEDICINE Advertisement for Doctor Hooper’s Female Pills, Published by Virtue of the King’s
Royal Letters Patent. Butler & Crispe. [no date c. 1850] £198
4to., single sheet, printed on both sides. A little staining and crinkling, otherwise very good. Advertising leaf-
let for Dr Hooper’s Female Pills issued by pharmacists Butler & Crispe of 14 Charterhouse
Buildings, Goswell Road, London. With duty paid stamp attached.
John Hooper, an apothecary in Reading, England, patented his ‘Female Pills’ in 1743 – they are among the
earliest and most successful ‘patent medicines’ sold in England. Promoted as anti-hysteria pills, they were
also used for stomach and period problems. An advertisement from the 1750s describes them as “the best
medicine ever discovered for young women, when afflicted with what is commonly called the
irregularities”. It was also suggested that pregnant women should not take them, which inevitably led to the
pills being used in the hope of ending an inconvenient pregnancy. The pills were still being sold both in
England and the United States well into the twentieth century.
12 PAGET, H.M. The First Match of the British Ladies
Football Club. Original woodcut as published
in The Graphic, March 30, 1895. 390 x 280 mm. £125
13 PARKHURST, Anita. The Friendly Road. Original
lithograph with colour, published by and for the Bureau
of Social Education National Board of the Young Women
Christian Associations, printed by Rode & Brand lithogra-
phers, New York, c.1920. 685 x 510 mm. £1,250
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 8
14 PITMAN, Jenny. On the Edge. Macmillan, 2002. £ 48
8vo, original boards, in dust-jacket; fine; provenance: from the library of Gerry Albertini (facsimile copy of
his bookplate tipped in at front). Albertini was a racehorse owner who lived for a period on the grounds of
Stacumny House in Tipperary. This is owned by the Ryan family (of Ryanair) who are also closely involved
with racing and stud. Albertini’s brother William also ran a stud farm at Tullamaine Castle and was Master
of Tipperary Foxhounds.
First edition. Signed and dated by author.
15 VAKA, Demetra. The Unveiled Ladies of Stam-
boul. Boston and New York, Houghton Mifflin
Company, 1923. £248
8vo. Original decorative maroon cloth, lettered in red;
pp. x, [2], 260, [2], plates after photographs; lower
outer corners with bumps, otherwise a very good copy.
First edition, rather rare. The Greek Demetra Vaka
(born in 1877) married the American novelist
Kenneth Brown and wrote a number of books between
1911 and 1923, both fiction and non-fiction, dealing
mainly with Islam and life in the Turkish empire. She
died in 1946. The present book tells of her return to
Constantinople and the changing role of women in the
city, the advancement of Atatürk’s reforms and
adverse reactions and the drive to create a mono-eth-
nic modern republic.
“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me:
I am a free human being with an independent will.”
- Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 9
WOMEN IN POLITICS
“The size of your dreams must always exceed your current capacity to achieve them. If
your dreams do not scare you, they are not big enough.”
—Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, President of Liberia, at Harvard Commencement
16 KOLLONTAI, Aleksandra. Typescript letter, signed
in ink. [Moscow], December 4, 1946. £450
8vo, one page, together with the addressed and
stamped envelope; previous fold, envelope carelessly
opened.
This letter by the revolutionary and left-wing politi-
cian, sidelined by the Bolshevik mainstream, is written
to
a widowed comrade, Ekaterina, who after the loss of
her husband is encouraged to seek consolation and
mental support in true Communist comradeship and
party solidarity. Typically, Kolontai does not make any
reference to Stalin or the higher echelons of politics.
VAT included.
17 [LASKI, Mrs. Sarah]. Mrs. Sarah Laski. The
Liberal and Progressive candidate. Efficiency in
Service and Economy in Administration. Manchester:
John P. Whittle 1929. £ 80
8vo. Pamphlet with photograph portrait to front; pp.3;
a little chipping to edges, very good.
Rare election pamphlet for the Cheetham Ward Mu-
nicipal Bye-Election of August 20th, 1929, in which
Mrs Laski contested, and won, a seat on Manchester
City Council. As the biographical statement in this
pamphlet shows, she was already a well-known figure
in Jewish welfare work as well as being the widow of
Nathan Laski, orthodox Jewish leader and grandee of
the Liberal party, and mother of Harold Laski, the
socialist intellectual and chairman of the Labour Party
in 1945 when Attlee won the General Election. Mrs
Laski continued as member of Manchester City Coun-
cil until her death in 1945.
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 1018 MURDOCH, Iris. The Existentialist Political Myth. Foreword by Robin Waterfield. Moseley. The De-
los Press. 1989. £198
8vo., original printed wrappers in cloth slipcase. A fine copy.
Limited edition of 225 numbered copies, this one of 45 copies signed by the author. Produced by Vivian
Ridler at the Perpetua Press Oxford. This essay first appeared in The Socratic Digest Oxford 1952.
19 NESBIT, Edith Ballads & Lyrics of Socialism.
The Fabian Society. 1908. £498
8vo., original red wrappers, lettered in black on spine
and upper board. A very good copy.
First edition. The author’s own copy with her owner-
ship signature “E. Nesbit, Well Hall, Eltham S.E. 9”
on inside of front wrapper. Better known now as the
author of The Railway Children and other children’s
books, Nesbit was also a co-founder
of The Fabian Society.
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 1120 [CATT, Carrie Chapman]. PECK, Mary Gray. Carrie Chapman Catt. A Biography. New York:
The H.W. Wilson Company. 1944. £700
8vo. Original black cloth, gilt lettering to upper board and spine; pp. 495, frontispiece and illustrations; very
good. Provenance: signed to front pastedown by Carrie Chapman Catt and Mary Gray Peck. From the
library of George V. Denny, Jr. (1899-1959), broadcaster and host of “America’s Town Meeting of the
Air.”
First edition. This is the biography of one of the most important figures in the American women’s suffrage
movement. Carrie Chapman Catt (1859-1947) succeeded Susan B. Anthony as the head of the National
American Woman Suffrage Association in 1900. She developed a two-prong campaign which came to be
known as Mrs. Catt’s “Winning Plan” and which sought passage of a federal suffrage amendment while
continuing to push for winning suffrage for women on a state level. Her tact and statesmanship won over
Woodrow Wilson and other influential politicians. She cleared the path for the 19th Amendment by leading
the NAWSA in a campaign in 1917 to unseat four unsympathetic senators and her life’s work culminated in
1920 with the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment giving women the vote. According to NAW, “To
Mrs. Catt more than any other single figure beside Susan B. Anthony, American women owe their right to
vote.” (NAW I, pp. 309-313. Wheeler, One Woman, One Vote, pp. 295- 315).
I want to do it because I want to do it. Women must
try to do things as men have tried. When they fail,
their failure must be but a challenge to others.
- Amelia Earhart
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 1221 PHILLIPS, Catharine. Reasons why the People Called Quakers Cannot so Fully Unite with the Meth-
odists, in their missions to the negroes in the West India Islands and Africa. London, James Phillips and
George Yard, 1792. £498
8vo. 20th-century three-quarter calf over cloth-covered boards, spine lettered in gilt; pp. 22, [2, publish-
er’s catalogue]; a little browning or spotting in places. Very rare first edition. ‘Catherine Payton Phillips (16
March 1727 – 16 August 1794), a Quaker minister and writer. She also campaigned for greater representation
of women within the formal structure of the Religious Society of Friends, which eventually resulted in the
establishment of Women’s Yearly Meeting in 1784’ (Library of Birmingham, online). She travelled almost
9000 miles in America between 1753 and 1756, thus observing the situation of the African slaves and debat-
ing the positions of the dissenting faith communities in North America. In this missive, which was published
in Philadelphia as well, she expresses her disdain for the baptism of infants, which is carried out among the
African American slaves.
‘Throughout the New Testament we do not find any precept or example for infant baptism. But alas! The
poor negroes must be taught, that it is necessary for their children to be sprinkled (baptised they are not) for,
dying without it, their souls are not safe’ (p. 17).
ESTC T84250; Sabin 62475.
22 PULSZKY, Theresa. Memoirs of a Hungarian Lady. Lon-
don, Henry Colburn, 1850. £248
Two volumes, 8vo. Original publisher’s blue cloth, spines lettered
in gilt and all-over ornamented in blind; pp. vi, cxxxv, [1], 203, [1],
16 (advertisements); iv, 370; light marking to covers, extremities
a little bumped, occasional light spotting, a very good set with the
armorial bookplates of Henry Birkbeck to front fly-leaves, with his
ownership inscription.
First edition of the autobiography of the spouse of prominent
Hungarian politician and revolutionary Ferenc Pulszky. It offers
an intriguing female perspective on the Hungarian Revolution
of 1848, and the subsequent war of independence - the failure of
which resulted in the couple being obliged to flee the country for
England, where in exile Pulszky composed this account of the
tumultuous period.
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 1323 Spy [Sir Leslie Ward] Georgina Weldon. Original lithograph, from the Vanity Fair series, published May 3, 1884. 345 190 mm.. £ 75 Mrs Weldon was instrumental, as a result of her time in the Law courts, in bringing about the establishment of the Court of Criminal Appeal and forcing Women’s rights to be re-examined. HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 14
WOMEN TR AVELLERS
‘a best-seller overnight [which] reached its nineteenth edition in 1896, and was translated into french,
german, italian, swedish, and hungarian’
24 BRASSEY, Anna [‘Annie’], Lady BRASSEY. A Voyage in the ‘Sunbeam’ our Home on the
Ocean for Eleven Months . London, Spottiswoode and Co. for Longmans, Green, and Co., 1879. £225
8vo. Original brown pictorial cloth, all edges gilt; pp. xix, 492; wood-engraved frontispiece, title-vignette,
illustrations in the text by G. Pearson after A.Y. Bingham, large folding colour-printed lithographic map by
Edward Weller; extremities very lightly rubbed, tears near gutters of frontispice and title, due to binding
error, otherwise near-fine.
New edition. Encouraged by the success of her travel books The Flight of the “Meteor” ([s.l.: 1866) and A
Cruise in “Eothen” (London: 1873), Baroness Brassey (1839-1887) and her husband Thomas, Baron
Brassey (1836-1918), decided to undertake a circumnavigation in the Sunbeam, their 531-ton, three-masted,
topsail schooner, with a 350-horsepower steam engine, which had been launched in 1874. The Sunbeam
embarked on 1 July 1876 with a complement of forty-four comprising the Brasseys and their children, a
small party of friends, a professional crew, and a complete domestic staff. Their voyage took them ‘across
the south Atlantic, through the Strait of Magellan into the Pacific Ocean, continuing by way of Tahiti,
Hawaii, and Japan to Penang and thence to Ceylon, Aden, and the Red Sea. While the Sunbeam passed
through the Suez Canal, Annie Brassey and the children went overland to Cairo to visit the pyramids,
rejoining the party at Alexandria. Their arrival at Hastings on 27 May 1877 completed the eleven-month
voyage. It had been a complete success, uneventful except for a dangerous flooding of the decks in a high
sea off Ushant and their rescue of the crew of a ship on fire near Rio. The monotony of the days at sea was
varied by excursions ashore, planned and led by Annie Brassey to the colourful street markets of Rio,
Valparaíso, and Singapore, and to scenes of natural beauty in Tahiti, Ceylon, and Hawaii with its thrilling
volcanoes. The voyage was to make Annie Brassey a celebrity not because she had been round the world in
a luxury yacht, but because she struck exactly the right note in her book about the adventure, using the
entries in her journal to describe rambles ashore and daily life afloat: this was lively enough with five
children under fourteen, a dog, three birds, and a kitten aboard. A Voyage in the “Sunbeam” (1878) was a
solid work of 508 pages with maps and wood-engravings. It was a best-seller overnight, reached its
nineteenth edition in 1896, and was translated into French, German, Italian, Swedish, and Hungarian [...]
The cruises of the Sunbeam may have resembled family picnics rather than voyages of discovery, but Annie
Brassey, who inspired and organized them, is not to be denied the status of a true traveller. A poor sailor,
never really well at sea, she dared all it could do to her, in order that she might visit the farthest corners of
the earth. As her husband wrote, “the voyage would not have been undertaken and assuredly it would never
have been completed without the impulse derived from her perseverance and determination”’ (ODNB). The
‘Preface to the New Edition’ states that ‘the letterpress has only been slightly curtailed and a copious
selection has been made from the original series of illustrations’ (p. vii), and the Appendix on pp. [481]-492
contains a summary of the entire voyage, compiled from the log-book.
Cf. Theakstone p. 32 (1st ed.).
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 1525 BREDON, Juliet. Peking. A Historical and Intimate Description of its Chief Places of Interest. Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, Hankow, Kelly & Walsh, Limited, 1922. £498 8vo. Original orange cloth, lettered in black, image of pagoda blocked in gilt on front cover, original dust- wrapper printed in orange and black; pp. [2], x, [4], 523, highly illustrated with plates after photographs and folding plans, wrappers with small flaws at head and tail of spine, light offsetting from endpapers, a few light spots here and there, otherwise a very beautiful copy with the rarely seen wrappers. Second edition (first, 1920), considerably enlarged and revised. The writer Juliet Bredon (c. 1881-1937) was the daughter of Sir Robert Edward Bredon, Bt (1846-1918), Deputy Inspector-General Imperial Maritime Customs, China, (1898-1908) and Acting Inspector-General of Customs with rank of Provincial Lieutenant- Governor (1908-1910). She spent much of her life in China, marrying Charles Lauru of Beijing, and she published a number of works on the country, including the present work, Chinese Shadows (Beijing: 1922), The Moon Year. A Record of Chinese Customs and Festivals (Shanghai: 1927), and a biography of her uncle, the famous inspector-general of customs in China, Sir Robert Hart Bt -- whose abilities and service were so highly regarded by the Chinese that ‘his Chinese honours excelled in number and distinction those bestowed on any other European’ (DNB) -- which was published in 1909. In her preface, Bredon explains that, ‘Several books have been written about Peking by foreigners, but among these only two are comprehensive - Monseigneur Favier’s monumental work Peking and Father Hyacinth Bitchurin’s Description of Peking. This paucity of accurate accounts is chiefly due to the obstacles in the way of collecting precise information. The more one studies the fascinating old city, the more one realises the tantalising difficulties of learning, even from the Chinese themselves, anything but the merest outline of its history and monuments. A proper appreciation of Peking is not, I believe, in the power of a Westerner to give - certainly not of one single person - since it pre-supposes a thorough knowledge of China’s past, an infinite sympathy with Chinese character and religions, an intimate sympathy with Chinese character and religions, an intimate familiarity with the proverbs and household phrases of the poor, the songs of the streets, the speech of the workshop, no less than the mentality of the literati and the motives of the rulers’ (p. vii). Therefore, her book intends to provide a fuller description of the city than a conventional guide-book that will be of interest to the general reader: ‘it aims at nothing original, - is simply a gathering up of the information of others, a gleaning from what has already been given to the world in a far better and fuller but less portable form. Its purpose is simply to play the part of a friend to resident and visitor alike - a friend (in whose taste you perhaps have confidence) to take you by the arm for a stroll through the city and its suburbs’ (pp.viii). However, Bredon’s book has subsequently become a very useful source on life in Beijing during the early twentieth century (and especially its architecture), and is widely cited in later literature on the period. HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 16
26 BURTON, Lady Isabel. The Inner Life Of Syria, Palestine, and the Holy Land, from my private Jour- nal. London, Henry S. King & Co., 1875. £998 8vo. 2 volumes. Bound in blue-green half-morocco over marbled boards (first half of the 20th century), spines with raised bands, ornamented and directly lettered in gilt, top edges gilt, marbled endpapers, pp. x, 376; [vi], 340, [4, advertisements]; each volume with Woodbury type portrait-frontispiece, 2 colourlitho- graphic plates and 1 large folding map, travel routes coloured by hand; corners very slightly worn, spines darkened, apart from light spotting initially to both volumes and even light marginal toning, a very good and clean copy. First edition. Lady Isabel Burton, devoted wife of Sir Richard Francis, was encouraged to write by him, having gone to meet him at Damascus in 1869. She describes her impressions and experiences of Syria, the Leba- non and Anti-Lebanon, and in particular a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. ‘Although she lived in Burton’s literary shadow, referring to herself as “the mere bellows player to the organist”, Isabel Burton was a good writer. Her Inner Life of Syria, Palestine, and the Holy Land (2 vols., 1875) compares favourably with her husband’s book about Syria, to which she also contributed ... Isabel Burton was noted for her concern for animals, of which she usually kept many. Her menagerie at Damascus was so varied that only with difficulty did she keep its members from devouring each other’ (ODNB). Blackmer 246, 2nd edition only. HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 17
27 CATLEEN, Ellen. Peking Studies. Shanghai, Kelly
and Walsh,1934. £998
Folio. Original cloth with photographic illustration mount-
ed to upper cover and title banner to fore-edge of upper
cover; pp. 87; numerous illustrations in photogravure, a few
with additional colour-printing, colourprinted city map,
thumb-nail sketches by F.H. Schiff; a little spotting to cov-
ers, previous owner’s inscription to front fly- leaf, minimal
spotting; a very good copy.
First edition. A gentle evocation of Peking using photo-
graphs taken with a Rolleiflex and Schiff ’s illustrations. The
photographs show various aspects of everyday life in the
city. Schiff ’s thumb-nail sketches relate a narrative in pic-
tures of Mr Pim and Mr Wu as they observe goings-on in
Peking. A fine collaboration between the Dutch author-pho-
tographer and Friedrich Schiff (1908-1968) who was born
in Austria and came to China in 1930 where he worked as
caricaturist for several newspapers and illustrated books. El-
len Thorbecke, who is using her maiden name here, was the
wife of the Dutch amabassador to China, a Sinophile, who
wrote a few books on Shanghai and other Chinese cities, all
splendid book productions, as here.
28 D’ESTE, Margaret. Through Corsica with a Camera.
New York and London, G. P. Putnam, 1905. £198
8vo. Original illustrated cloth; pp. xi, 144, photogravure
frontispiece with tissue guard, map, plates after photographs
(one bound in twice, instead of another one); spine and
endpapers a little darkened, covers a little dusted; a good
copy.
First edition, very rare. Despite the above mentioned defect
(one plate bound in twice, instead of another one, which
was omitted by the binder), we are offering this wonderful
travelogue with good photos of rough and rural Corsica, an
Island which was not documented by way of monographs
well into the middle of the 20th century.
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 1829 EDWARDS, Amelia B. A Midsummer Ramble in the Do-
lomites. London, George Routledge and Sons, 1890. £178
8vo. Publisher’s original blue cloth, image of mountains blocked
in white to upper cover, lettered in gilt to upper cover and spine,
edges uncut; pp. 389; numerous wood-engraved illustrations
including some full page, folding map; extremities minimally
rubbed, browning to endpapers, a very good copy.
Second edition (first, 1873), and the first with this abbreviated
title, updated and revised.
Neate E09.
30 EDWARDS, Amelia B. Pharaohs, Fellahs and Explorers.
New York: Harper and Brothers, 1892. £350
8vo. Original orange cloth with Egyptian frieze in gilt, red and
green panelled about gilt lettering to upper cover, lettered in gilt
to spine, top edge gilt, remainder untrimmed; pp. xix + 325; port.
frontispiece, numerous wood-engraved illustrations including
many after photographs by W.M.F. Petrie; rubbing to extremities,
past ownership inscription to front paste-down endpaper, a very
good copy.
Early reprint, one year after the first. Contains chapters on the
work of the Egyptian Exploration Fund (which Edwards helped
to found), the ancient buried cities, the origins of portrait paint-
ing, religion, literature, etc.
31 GUINNESS, Geraldine. In the Far East. Letters from Geral-
dine Guinness in China. (Now Mrs. Howard Taylor) … Third Edition,
Re-cast and Freshly illustrated. London Morgan & Scott for China
Inland Mission, 1901. £178
4to. Original green cloth lettered in dark red with vignette of a dragon
on upper cover; pp. xv, 183, highly illustrated throughout; very light
rubbing to extremities, internally a few minor spots, a very good copy.
Geraldine Guinnes was deply involved inn the China Inland Mission
and in 1888 left London, aged 22, for China and was stationed in
Henan province. In the Far East had appeared first in 1889, however,
this highly illustrated edition incorporates adds ‘most recent experi-
ences’ (half-title). These additions begin on page 144 and contain a
chapter on Buddhism.
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 1932 HILLYARD, Susan. Before The Oil. A Personal Memoir of
Abu Dhabi 1954-1958. [Beckenham, Country Books for HD
Press, 2002]. £325
Original cream boards with illustrated wrappers; pp. 236, illus-
trations after rarely seen photographs; as new.
Very rare first edition. Susan Hillyard, her husband Tim, a BP
representative, and their daughter Deborah, were the first Euro-
peans to settle in Abu Dhabi, a city that had yet to become a hub
for the oil industry. While Tim oversaw the construction of an
offshore exploration centre and liaised with Sheikh Shakhbut bin
Sultan Al Nahyan, the ruling emir of Abu Dhabi, and his brother
Sheikh Zayed Al Nahayan (later the first president of the United
Arab Emirates). By the time BP struck oil in 1958, at the Umm
Shaif offshore field, Susan had become a valued link between
the closeted realm hidden behind the walls of the royal palace of
Qasr al Hosn, with its veiled sheikhas and heady incense, and the
gin-and-tonic set of émigrés and struggling oil prospectors.
33 JENKINS, Lady Minna. Sport and Travel in Both Tibets;
With Map and Twenty-Five Coloured Illustrations Exactly Repro-
duced from the Authoress’s Original Sketches. London, Blades,
East & Blades, [1909]. £235
Tall 8vo. Original purple cloth, titled in gilt on spine and upper
cover, with a photographic portrait of the author laid down on the
upper cover, surrounded by her hunting trophies; pp. [vi], 87, with
25 colour plates after original paintings by the author, and a dou-
ble-page lithographed map, indicating the party’s route; binding a
little marked, small marginal tears to one plate, text with occasion-
al light spotting.
First edition. Lady Jenkins was an experienced big game hunt-
er and the aim of this expedition was to seek out the gazelles,
antelopes and wild sheep of Bahistan (Little Tibet), and in the
North-Western part of Tibet itself. She started her trip at Sri-
nagar, where whe stayed as a guest of the Maharajah of Kashmir,
and travelled over the Zoli la Pass (on the border of Kashmir and
Tibet), carrying on up to Leh, where she employed a caravan of
local shikaris and coolies, and began her long trek through the
Himalayan foothills. After the Lanak and Lungnak passes, due to
extremely bad weather conditions, unfortunately they had to turn
back. ‘One of the handful of Edwardian-era women who embarked
on her own hunting expeditions, Lady Jenkins departed from Sri-
nagar, traveled through Leh and Miroo and into the high country
of Changchenmo’ (Czech).
Yakushi J28. Czech p. 112..
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 2034 MACARTNEY, Lady Catherina Theodora. An English Lady in Chinese Turkestan. London, Ernest Benn Ltd., [1931]. £898 8vo. Publisher’s green cloth; pp. [vii], 236; sketch map and four photographic plates; cloth a little marked, front free endpaper replaced; occasional spotting to text only, a good copy of a very rare book. First edition of an important title on the Great Game in Central Asia, and a wonderful description of life in Kashgar and surroundings, now in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, in China’s far west on the Silk Road. ‘Catherina Theodora, second daughter of James Borland of Castle Douglas, Kirkcudbrightshire. She had never travelled before but revealed an exemplary ability to ‘make do’, hosting numerous Russian and Chinese diplomatic guests as well as any passing travellers from home’ (ODNB). ‘Col Francis Younghusband was the first British Resident in Kashgar, and from 1891 George Macartney (no relation to the first Ambassador to China in 1793) replaced Younghusband and stayed there until his retirement at the end of the First World War. One of the most important duties of the British Political Resident at Kashgar was to send periodic news reports or fortnightly diaries, channelled through the Government of India, to London. The contents of these reports and diaries range from the Resident’s daily dealings with the locals to political uprisings in the region. In the countries surrounding India’s frontiers, there was little secret intelligence of a direct military kind to be acquired. What the British Government needed to know was mainly political - Russian movement in the region, local events, which tribes might be plotting to overthrow some ruler and what might be the effect on the border tribes. The Political Resident at Kashgar, George Macartney, who was fully bilingual, managed to establish an amicable rapport with Chinese Taotai (a provincial administrator) as well as with the Russian Consul at Kashgar. Through his local contacts, he was well informed of political shifts and likely repercussions within or beyond the borders. In general, it could be said that, like every British Political Agent of that period, Macartney ran a local information or intelligence service, which Russians might have called a spy network, but it tended to be a very informal and parochial affair’ (British Library, Chinese Turkestan: British presence, online). HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 21
35 MAILLART, Ella K. Turkestan Solo. One Woman’s Expe-
dition from the Tien Shan to the Kizil Kum. New York, Putnam,
[1935]. £298
8vo. Original grey cloth, lettered and decorated in black, map
endpapers; pp. [x], 307; highly illustrated with black & white
photographic plates; light marking to cloth, a little spotted at the
beginning and end, otherwise clean and fresh, name on front
paste-down; half-title signed by the author.
First English language edition, the US issue of Ella Maillart’s first
book, signed. ‘For nine months Mademoiselle Maillart journeyed,
mostly on camels and horse-back, through countries with tem-
peratures varying from the two extremes of heat and cold, from
the mountains of Tien Shan in North West Mongolia to Kazalinsk
near the shores of Lake Aral. Her route took her through the Des-
ert of Kizil Kum and the steppes of the Kirghiz Kazaks, land of the
eagle-hunters; she mixed with the crowds in the bazaars of Tash-
kent and Karakol and took the road to Samarkand’ (dust-wrapper
of the second, 1938, editon).
Yakushi M41b.
36 [MAZUCHELLI, Elizabeth Sara, ‘Nina’]. The Indian Alps
and How We Crossed Them. Being A Narrative Of Two Years’ Res-
idence In The Himalaya And Two Months’ Tour Into The Interior.
By A Lady Pioneer. London, Longmans, Green, and Co., 1876.
£798
Royal 8vo. Publisher’s original red cloth, vignette of the author
carried by bearers in gilt to central panel of upper cover, elaborate
gilt border to vignette, vignette of tents among trees at foot of spine,
lettered in gilt, top edges gilt; pp. xvi, 612; 10 chromolithographic
plates after the author, numerous woodcut illustrations to text, 1
large folding lithographic map, border colouring in pink, author’s
routes in red; binding a little
rubbed and marked, occasional foxing to margins of plates and to
tissue-guards, in general a nice copy.
First edition. The author, along with her Army chaplain husband
and bearers, followed the Nepal-Sikkim frontier along the Singalila
Ridge. Her account of the climb up into the Himalayas begins very
much as a travelogue, full of purple prose and comments on the
peoples and scenery the party encountered. As they get higher into
the mountains, however, the deteriorating weather, the difficulty of
the terrain and the failure of supplies take their toll. The author’s
compelling narrative captures well the sufferings of the party. Cou-
pled with the striking illustrations of the breathtaking landscapes
through which they passed, this is quite properly a ‘handsome vol-
ume’ (Neate). Nina was ‘the first Englishwoman to have travelled so
far into the eastern Himalaya’ (Robinson, Wayward Women).
Yakushi M126; Neate M74.
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 22One of 100 signed de luxe copies with an original gouache
37 MEE, Margaret Ursula. Flowers of the Brazilian Forests Collected and Painted by Margaret Mee
Foreword on the Brazilian Forests by Roberto Burle Marx with a Preface by Sir George Taylor. London: L. van
Leer & Company for The Tryon Gallery in association with George Rainbird, 1968.
£7,000
Folio (530 x 390mm). Original full natural vellum by Zaehnsdorf, gilt facsimile of author’s signature
blocked on upper board, vignette of a tejú-assu lizard after Mee blocked in gilt on lower board, spine
lettered in gilt, endpapers with printed vignettes of the tejú-assu after Mee, top edges gilt, original green
cloth slipcase with gilt lettering-piece on upper panel, original shipping carton addressed to Richard
Mitchell, Aldham, Essex and with limitation numbers; pp. [80], title printed in green and black; illustration:
original gouache over pencil painting on paper watermarked ‘Raffaello Fabbriano’ signed ‘Margaret Mee’
and titled ‘Bauhinia’ and further inscribed ‘44’ mounted as an additional frontispiece, retaining tissue guard,
32 colour-lithographed plates including frontispiece, all plates retaining tissue guards, text illustrations,
double-page map [after Greville Mee] printed in red and black showing Mee’s journeys and the locations
where the flowers depicted were collected, with loose original prospectus; a fine copy.
First and only edition, limited to 500 copies, this no. 42 of 100 de luxe copies signed by Mee to verso of
title page and with an original gouache by Mee. Both the issues of 100 de luxe copies and of six copies
reserved for the artist contain an original gouache painting by Mee mounted as a frontispiece. Mee’s early
expeditions into the Amazon region culminated in this, the first major publication of her Brazilian flower
paintings and a botanical book of the greatest importance. Not only are the images the result of painstaking
observation and meticulous attention to detail, the descriptions -- supplemented by notes from Mee’s own
travel diaries -- were written by the noted Brazilian, American, and British taxonomists Luiz Emygdio de
Mello, Bassett Maguire, André Robyns, Richard S. Cowan, Lyman B. Smith, John J. Wurdack, B.L. Burtt,
David R. Hunt, Guido F.J. Pabst, and Raulino Reitz. The text, which is prefaced by an introduction by
Mee’s friend Roberto Burle Marx (1909-1994), the famed Brazilian artist and landscape gardener, has an
authoritative rigour that supports the magnificent illustrations. [...]
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 23[...] As George Taylor (the Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew) remarked in his preface, ‘special
scientific interest and importance attaches to certain of the plates, which portray species new to science, or
are illustrated for the first time, and the consummate quality of all the paintings is enhanced by botanical
accuracy in the observation of detail [...] Mee’s work is of an unusually high order of excellence, and in the
best tradition of flower painting’. The three new species described and illustrated are the Catasetum meeae
(no. 16, ‘collected by Margaret Mee in the State of Amazonas, at the Içana River [in December 1964], and
brought into cultivation at São Paolo where it flowered in July 1965’, and named for Mee by Pabst); the
Spathiphyllum grazielae (no. 31, collected in Paranapiacaba, São Paolo, in February 1967); the Neoregelia
margaretae (no. 25, collected by Mee by the Rio Içana in January 1965 and named for her by Smith). Ruth
Stiff and Simon Mayo state that, ‘during her journeys, Margaret Mee collected four of the five species of
Neoregalia known from Amazonian Brazil, and is credited with first discovering three of them herself -- N.
margaretae, N. leviana, and N. meeana. Margaret’s significant contribution to the knowledge of this genus
helped establish her reputation as both a scientist and a botanical explorer. As Neoregalia margaretae has
not yet been recollected, it is known only from Margaret’s collections’ (M. Mee Margaret Mee’s Amazon
(Woodbridge and Kew: 2004), p. 302).
Flowers of the Brazilian Forests was conceived when Mee’s work attracted the attention of Sir George
Taylor, the Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, after she had won the Royal Horticultural Society’s
Grenfell Medal in 1960. Together with the Right Hon. Aylmer Tryon, the owner of the Tryon Gallery in
Mayfair, and Wilfrid Blunt, the historian of botanical art, Taylor formulated a plan to publish Mee’s work.
The Duke of Edinburgh agreed to be a Patron of the project and Tryon made arrangements with George
Rainbird, the gifted book designer, to design and produce the magnificent folio. Rainbird had bought the
celebrated binder Zaehnsdorf in the mid-1950s and so it was natural that they should be commissioned to
produce the fine bindings in natural vellum.
Mee left the Instituto de Botânica in São Paolo in 1965 and dedicated much of the next two years to the
production of the book. This was exhausting work, since she not only had to prepare the thirty-two images
for publication but also to complete the original gouaches that were inserted into the de luxe copies. The
book was ready for publication by the summer of 1967 and was launched with a private view and dinner at
the Tryon Gallery in the November, which was followed by a full exhibition in January 1968. Nearly all of
the 500 copies were sold out in advance. The book was a commercial landmark; moreover, the critical
response was overwhelming, and Wilfrid Blunt wrote in the Journal of the Royal Horticultural Society that
the paintings ‘place Mrs Mee in the first rank of botanical artists. Indeed they would stand without shame in
the high company of Georg Dionys Ehret and Redouté’.
“As I stood there with the dim outline of the forest all around
I was spellbound. Then the first petal began to move and then
another as the flower burst into life.”
-Margaret Mee
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 2438 MONTAGU, Mary Wortley, Lady. Letters from the Levant, during the Embassy to Constantinople, 1716-18 ... With A Preliminary Discourse and Notes, containing A Sketch of her Ladyship’sCharacter, Moral and Literary, by J. A. St. John. London, Joseph Rickerby, 1838. £198 Small 8vo. Contemporary speckled calf, spine with black morocco lettering-pice; pp. [3]-9, [3], lxiii, v, [7]- 283, [4, advertisements; hinges restored at an early date, evenly lightly toned, a very good copy of a scarce book. First edition. ‘Lady Mary left London in August 1716 to accompany her husband [Edward Wortley Montagu] on his embassy to Constantinople, seat of the Ottoman empire. Owing to the transformation of European politics by the battle of Peterwardein shortly after they set out, and a requirement that Wortley Montagu pick up further instructions at both Hanover and Vienna, they travelled overland, criss-crossing Europe on the way. They reached Turkey in spring 1717, after a fearsome journey through wolf-infested forests and across the battlefield of Peterwardein (where bodies of men, horses, and camels still lay deep- frozen in the snow). Lady Mary sent home long letters describing her travels, and she kept copies for future reworking as a travel book. She laid a foundation of expertise in Turkish culture in three weeks billeted in Belgrade with an efendi, or Islamic scholar, with whom she had wide-ranging conversations on oriental languages, literature, religions, and social customs. She was delighted with the civility of women at a public bath building in Sofia, socially poised and graciously welcoming although stark naked. Lady Mary’s time in Turkey (divided between Adrianople, Constantinople, and Belgrade Village, a country retreat near the latter) turned out to be brief. Her husband, hoping to win great national and personal benefit by brokering a peace between the Ottoman and Austrian empires, found himself recalled, purely, it seems, because of a change of ministry at home. Very reluctantly, the Wortley Montagu family (with a new addition, a baby born on 19 January 1718: the future Mary Stuart, countess of Bute) sailed for home on 5 July 1718. Lady Mary was consoled for leaving Constantinople by the scholarly pleasures of a Mediterranean voyage. She and her husband disembarked at Genoa, crossed the Alps, and made a last stop in Paris, where she observed the peak period of John Law’s Mississippi scheme’ (ODNB). Earlier collections of Lady Montagu’s writings and letters had been badly edited and censored; James Augustus St. John, an Oriental traveller and writer, with liberal, at times radical, leanings tried to improve on these earlier attempts and inluded hitherto unpublished material. HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 25
39 PFEIFFER, Ida Laura. A Visit to the Holy Land, Egypt, and Italy, translated by Henry William
Dulcken. London: Levy, Robson, and Franklin for Ingram, Cooke, and Co, 1852. £198
8vo. Original green cloth, spine blocked in gilt, cover allover ornamented in blind, lemon-yellow endpapers;
pp. xv, 336, [4, advertisements] colour-printed wood-engraved frontispiece, additional title in colour (both
in paginations), and 6 plates by Edmund Evans; a very good copy, name on front fly-leaf.
First English edition. Pfeiffer’s account of her first journey, travelling via Istanbul to Beirout, and thence to Je-
rusalem, before continuing to Palestine and Egypt, which was first published in German in 1846. The beauti-
ful colour illustrations show Jerusalem, Nazareth, Scutari, the Dead Sea, Carmel, Lebanon, Balbeck, and Suez.
Ibrahim-Hilmy p. 114; Theakstone p.213; Wayward Women p. 25.
40 PFEIFFER, Ida. Visit To Iceland and the Scandinavian North. Translated from the original
German ... To which are added an Essay on Icelandic Poetry, from the French of M. Bergmann; a translation
of the Icelandic Poem the Voluspa; and a brief Sketch of Icelandic History. Ingram, Cooke, and Co., 227
Strand, 1852. £198
Small 8vo. Publisher’s original green blindstamped cloth, decorated and lettered in gilt to spine; pp. 354; 8
tinted wood-engraved plates (including frontispiece and additional illustrated title); light fading to spine,
internally clean, a very good copy.
First edition in English. Mrs. Pfeiffer was an intrepid Austrian traveller; in 1842 she visited the Holy Land
and in 1845 she travelled to Iceland in search of “sublime natural phenomena”. This account of her travels
includes descriptions of Reykjavik, the island of Vidõe, the salmon-fishery at Laxselv, Christiania (Oslo)
and Stockholm. The illustrations depict some of these locations, as well as geysers in Iceland, the Falls of
Trollhatta and Mount Hecla. In the course of her narrative, Pfeiffer comments on such diverse topics as
Icelandic diet, volcanic phenomena, the English side-saddle and much else. Ida Pfeiffer ‘was the first fulltime
woman traveller’ (Robinson p. 25).
Abbey, Travel 161.
41 SOLTERA, Maria (Mary Lester). A Lady’s Ride
Across Spanish Honduras. Edinburgh, William
Blackwood, 1884. £248
8vo. Original green decorative cloth; pp 319, [24, advertise-
ments], 6 tinted lithographic plates after drawings by the
author; spine a little rubbed, internally even light browning,
as usual, inoffensive shelfmark number on title verso, other-
wise very good.
First edition, increasingly rare. Maria Soltera (Spanish for
‘Mary Spinster’) is the pseudonym of Mary Lester. This travel
narrative is a vivid account of riding sidesaddle by mule
cross some 300 miles of mountainous land. A keen observer,
without prior knowledge of Honduras and the Spanish lan-
guage, the author noted the exotic animal life, social customs,
and political conditions of a jungle-trail-world at the end
of the 19th century.
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 26Not quick enough
off the mark?
Take a look at our
other Freya Stark
items here.
42 STARK, Freya. Baghdad Sketches ... Illustrations by E.N. Prescott. Baghdad, The Times Press,
Ltd., 1932. £2,950
8vo. Original red cloth with printed paper label to spine and front cover; pp. [vii], 132; 12 plates after
drawings by Prescott; spine label a little flawed, insect mark to front hinges, one wormhole from front cover
to p. 21, light fading to spine, darkening to cloth, signed presentation inscription, dated Kuwait,
November, 1932 on front fly-leaf.
First edition of Freya Stark’s first book, published in Baghdad, now very rare, inscribed by her to
Rose Young. The paper quality, as well as that of the cloth binding, were inferior to that used in the later
British book of the same title. Freya Stark describes the now almost completely destroyed multicultural life
of the city, including one 11-page chapter on Kuwait. A contemporary review in the Geographical Journal
read ‘Miss Stark is entirely free from the guide-book manner, and her studies of the country and people
have an engaging freshness. Shrewd observation and sympathy mingle in her pages ... These sketches
convey, better than far more pretentious volumes, the strange fascination of the country; its blend of
antiquity and beauty with squalor, of laisser faire with racial pride and ambition’ (vol. 81, 1933, p. 361).
The print run of this edition is unknown, but probably limited to 500 copies - certainly Stark, who worked
for the ‘Baghdad Times’ throughout 1932, received no payment until 500 copies were sold (letter to Venetia
Buddicum, February 20, 1932). The boards of the present copy are definitely heavier and thicker than all
others we have handled.
Provenance: Rose Young (later Lady Rose Young) was the wife of Major Sir Hubert Winthrop Young who,
in 1932, was appointed the first Minister of Baghdad and published a sympathetic book, The Independent
Arab (1933), detailing his diplomatic and military time in the Middle East. Stark holidayed with the Youngs
and Mrs. Julian Huxley in Kuwait in early 1932. ‘We had our dish of rice and sheep and ate it with our
fingers (Mrs. Huxley not really enjoying it) . The Youngs are charming to be out with: so pleasant and
pleased with little things like beetles or sunsets or food’ (from a letter to her mother, Flora Stark in: Over the
Rim of the World ... Selected Letters. Edited by Caroline Moorehead, p. 83). ‘At Lawrence’s request Young
was transferred to the Hejaz operations in March 1918 as general staff officer, grade 2 (GSO2). He
organized transport and supplies for the composite force which cut the railway behind the Turkish army just
before Allenby’s final attack. He was mentioned in dispatches, and received the DSO (1919), and order of
El Nahdha, third class. After a short period as president of the local resources board in Damascus (1918), he
took leave to England. In Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1926) Lawrence praised Young as energetic, capable,
and strong-willed, ‘a regular of exceptional quality … rising, as ever, to any occasion’ (Lawrence, 524, 577).
Young served in the new eastern department of the Foreign Office (1919–21), where his Arab experience
helped form the policy eventually adopted in Iraq. He was assistant secretary in the Middle East department,
Colonial Office, from its formation in 1921 until the end of 1926. He was colonial secretary, Gibraltar
(1927–9), counsellor to the high commissioner for Iraq (1929–32), and envoy-extraordinary and minister-
plenipotentiary in Baghdad (October and November 1932)’ (ODNB).
HENRY SOTHER AN LTD [Contents] International Women’s Day 2018 27You can also read
