baron corvo - Callum James Books

BARON CORVO
One Hundred Items from the Collection of Robert Scoble
CALLUM JAMES BOOKS
November 2013
BARON CORVO
One Hundred Items from the Collection of Robert Scoble
Detail from an original photograph of Rolfe’s loculus (see item 75)
BARON CORVO
One Hundred Items
from the Collection of
Robert Scoble
Offered for sale
by Callum James Books
in the
Corvo Centenary Year
2013
This catalogue was published online in November 2013.
At the same time, as a tangible record of Dr Scoble’s
collection, and as a contribution to Corvine bibliography,
a limited edition of 50 copies of this catalogue has
been printed and signed by the collector and publisher
This is number:
To
the Members of the Corvine Society
acknowledging their dedication
to the memory of Frederick Rolfe
Callum James Books
31A Chichester Road
Portsmouth
UK - PO2 0AA
+44 (0)2392 696150
[email protected]
Front Free Endpaper Blog:
callumjames.blogspot.com
Website: www.callumjamesbooks.com
Twitter: @CallumJBooks
Cover illustration: Jacket illustration by Frank C Papé
for item no. 8
Text and images
© Callum James Books/Robert Scoble 2013
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Photographs in this catalogue are not to the
same scale.
This catalogue lists one hundred items
from the Frederick Rolfe collection
put together by Dr Robert Scoble
over the forty years 1972 to 2012.
Among its highlights:
A copy of the scarce slate-grey issue
of In His Own Image
A dustjacketed copy of The Weird of the Wanderer
with a long inscription by Harry Pirie-Gordon as ‘Caliban’
A rebound copy of Innocent the Great
inscribed in Latin by Harry Pirie-Gordon
One of a very few sets of sheets of R A Caton’s projected
Fortune Press edition of In His Own Image
The only copy outside the Library of Congress of the Tragara Press
pamphlet A Letter to the Marquis de Ruvigny
An exceptionally fine dustjacketed copy
of Hubert’s Arthur
And a great number of items either accompanied by related ephemera
or inscribed by prominent Corvines
PART 1
THE WRITINGS AND LETTERS
OF
FREDERICK ROLFE
BARON CORVO
1.
ROLFE, Frederick
Tarcissus
1972
The Victim Press edition, enclosed in a clear plastic envelope and held in a printed card
cover by means of a white slide-on spring. The cover’s upper board reproduces some
elements of the title page, and the inside of the lower board has a reproduction of the
Belgian artist Gaston Goor’s drawing of the dying St Tarcisius. The covers of this copy
show some signs of foxing.
10
£20
2.
CORVO, Baron
Stories Toto Told Me
1898
John Lane: the Bodley Head, London & New York. FIRST EDITION. Attractively
rebound, with the paper covers of the original Bodley Head booklet intact, in dark green
quarter-leather with five raised bands and gold lettering on the spine. Signature of previous
owner at top right of the original front cover: ‘J V Kitto.’ Woolf A2.
John Vivian Kitto was Assistant Librarian of the House of Commons from 1908 and
Librarian from 1937 to 1946.
£65
11
3.
CORVO, Baron
Stories Toto Told Me
1898
John Lane: the Bodley Head, London & New York. FIRST EDITION. Rebound in green
cloth, with the covers of the original Bodley Head booklet intact. The contents, including
the Bodley Head covers, are quite exceptionally bright, label on backstrip lacks small
piece. The original owner has inscribed one of the initial blank leaves: ‘Hal from Laoy.
Aug 1900.’ Woolf A2.
12
£50
4.
CORVO, Baron
‘How I was Buried Alive’
1898
A complete set of Volume II of The Wide World Magazine, with the numbers from October
1898 to March 1899 bound together in the original Wide World Magazine illustrated
binding. A couple of pages loose and laid in, one section slightly sprung, boards a little
bumped and rubbed. Woolf C72.
Rolfe’s most controversial journal article, which gave rise to the accusation, in the
Aberdeen newspaper The Daily Free Press, that Rolfe was a practised cadger and
charlatan. Rolfe’s article appeared in the November 1898 number, illustrated by Alan
Wright under Rolfe’s ‘supervision.’ In the illustrations, Rolfe himself has been given a full
head of hair and the Duchess Sforza Cesarini has been slimmed down. Rolfe has obviously
given Wright a careful description of Toto, who is drawn with his distinctive curly black
hair.
£40
13
5.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
In His Own Image
1901
John Lane: the Bodley Head, London & New York. FIRST EDITION. The extremely
scarce slate-grey issue with the imprint ‘The Bodley Head’ at the foot of the spine. Woolf
states on page 38 of his Bibliography that he had only seen two copies thus. Woolf A4a.
£120
14
6.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
In His Own Image
1901
John Lane: the Bodley Head, London & New York. The American issue of the FIRST
EDITION in purple silky cloth boards, as described by Woolf on page 35 of his
Bibliography. Spine faded from purple to uniform brown. Previous owner’s name and
address on front pastedown endpaper. Woolf A4a.
£35
15
7.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
In His Own Image
1901
John Lane: the Bodley Head, London & New York. FIRST EDITION. The midnight
blue issue with Colonial sheets, as described by Woolf on page 39 of his Bibliography.
This issue is scarce, although Woolf states that copies ‘are occasionally found.’ Previous
owner’s name and date on front free endpaper. Woolf A4a.
£50
16
8.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
In His Own Image
1924
John Lane: the Bodley Head, London & New York. The second impression, with an
Introduction by Shane Leslie, adapted from his article (below) in The London Mercury.
Dustjacket by Frank C Papé has some chips and losses. Woolf A4b.
together with
LESLIE, Shane
‘Frederick Baron Corvo’
1923
A copy of the September 1923 number of The London Mercury in which this
groundbreaking Shane Leslie article appeared. The article marks the first attempt to
propose Rolfe as an estimable literary figure and to put together a Rolfe bibliography.
£75
17
9.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
In His Own Image
1969
Proposed Fortune Press edition. One of only a few stapled sets of sheets. Introduction by
‘Richard Grimloe.’ Contained in a custom clamshell box.
According to Timothy d’Arch Smith, in his R.A Caton and The Fortune Press: A Memoir
and a Hand-List, ‘This was to have been the swan-song of the Knole Park Press, a printing
firm [at Sevenoaks] employed by Caton for many books, as its typeface was becoming too
battered for further use. The book reached only the proof-stage. The editor’s name is a
pseudonym and an anagram of Gilmore, a schoolboy with whom he was acquainted.’
£450
18
10.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
Chronicles of the House of Borgia
1901
Grant Richards. FIRST EDITION. One of only 730 copies of the UK issue, published a
month before the American issue. Spine faded, as with almost all copies. Some foxing of
the endpapers and edges, but not internally. Woolf A5a.
£100
19
11.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
A History of the Borgias
1931
The Modern Library. FIRST AMERICAN EDITION. This edition was printed in great
numbers. There were so many binding colours and cover design changes that priority is
now impossible to establish. This copy has a russet-brown binding with small black title
squares on the upper cover and spine. The copies examined by Woolf listed the (missing)
appendices on the Contents page, but this copy does not, which may mean it is a relatively
late printing. Its condition is very good, with a previous owner’s inked name at the top of
the front free endpaper. Woolf A5b.
20
£10
12.
ROLFE, Fr.
Hadrian the Seventh
1904
Chatto & Windus. FIRST EDITION. One of only 700 copies of the first issue. The
backstrip is detached at the rear edge, hinges a little weak. Signed in 1904 on the front free
endpaper, and again at the top of the title page, by J D Butler. Woolf A6a.
J D Butler was one of the leaders of Henry Hyndman’s Social Democratic Federation.
£550
21
13.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
Hadrian the Seventh
1953
Knopf. FIRST AMERICAN EDITION, third printing. Woolf A6b.
With a new and somewhat infelicitous introduction by the Corvo enthusiast Herbert
Weinstock. Woolf has drawn attention to its handsome binding. Rolfe’s lozenge device is
blind-stamped on the upper cover, but the artist (Georgiana Schiffmacher) has hung only
one tassel from the heraldic priest’s hat, instead of the conventional two, possibly to signal
the fact that Rolfe was never ordained.
22
£20
14.
ROLFE, Fr
Don Tarquinio
1905
Chatto & Windus. FIRST EDITION. One of only 760 copies of the primary binding.
Water-damaged boards and spine sunned to a uniform brown, but internally very good, with
a Subscription Library label on the front pastedown endpaper. Woolf A7.
£25
23
15.
ROLFE, Fr
Don Tarquinio
1905
Chatto & Windus. FIRST EDITION. One of only 101 copies of the scarce binding variant
ii, described by Woolf on page 54 of his Bibliography. Previous owner’s name and address
inked on front pastedown endpaper. Spine has sunned to a uniform brown. Internally very
good, endpapers foxed. Woolf A7.
24
£40
16.
PIRIE-GORDON, C H C
Innocent The Great
1907
Longmans, Green and Co. FIRST EDITION. Expertly rebound, retaining all fold-out
genealogical tables and maps. Inscribed by Pirie-Gordon in Latin, translated thus: ‘Author
and friend, Harry, gives and dedicates this chronicle of the achievements of the pontifical
son of Claricia Romana to the American Lady Clarice.’ With printed request in Latin,
opposite the list of contents, from ‘Frederick, Pro-Prefect of the Congregation of Culture
[‘Humanitae’] of the Order of Sanctissima Sophia’ for permission to print the book. This is
the only mention in any source of Rolfe’s precise title within the Order. Woolf B5.
together with
A print of a photograph (6.25cm by 8.75cm) of C H C Pirie-Gordon dressed in his robes
as Grand Master of the Order of Sanctissima Sophia. Inscribed on the reverse in grey
ink by Anthony d’Offay to Alan Anderson: ‘Alan A from Anthony d’O 11:10:60.’ This
photograph was reproduced in Miriam J Benkovitz’s 1977 biography of Rolfe.
£120
25
17.
PROSPERO & CALIBAN
The Weird of the Wanderer
1912
William Rider & Son. FIRST EDITION. The ultimate copy, with the fountain pen
inscription of its co-author Harry Pirie-Gordon: ’For Anthony d’Offay / on this Friday
22nd July 1960 / being the centenary of the birth of / FREDERICK ROLFE (remembered
/ by me as Hadrian) who styled himself / BARON CORVO, also PROSPERO / and was
accordingly pleased to call / Harry Pirie-Gordon / his collaborator in this book / Caliban.’
The jacket is almost complete with a few chips at the edges. A batch of jacketed copies
of this book was discovered in the late 1950s by a rare book dealer, who reinforced all the
jackets with tape along all the internal edges and folds, with the unfortunate consequence
that this copy, like all other surviving jacketed copies, has a uniform darkening along its
borders. A little foxing on extremities and on a few pages. Spine has sunned to a uniform
brown. Anthony d’Offay bookplate. Woolf B9.
26
£1,200
18.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
The Rubáiyát of ‘Umar Khaiyám
1924
John Lane The Bodley Head. SECOND EDITION. First issue, but with the second issue
dustjacket. Very good with some spots of foxing at extremities. Woolf B2b.
£100
27
19.
CORVO, Frederick Rolfe Baron
The Desire and Pursuit of the Whole
1934
Cassell. FIRST EDITION. Fine copy in fine dustjacket, with a small (2 cm) bookseller’s
label at the foot of the front pastedown endpaper. Woolf A10a.
28
£200
20.
CORVO, Frederick Rolfe Baron
The Desire and Pursuit of the Whole
1953
Cassell. FIRST EDITION. Second impression, with the important foreword by W H
Auden. Fine copy in fine dustjacket. Woolf A10b.
£50
29
21.
CORVO, Frederick Rolfe Baron
The Desire and Pursuit of the Whole
1953
New Directions. FIRST AMERICAN ISSUE. Dustjacket by Andy Warhol. Fine copy in
fine dustjacket. Woolf A10c.
30
£100
22.
ROLFE, Frederick
The Desire & Pursuit of the Whole
1993
Quartet Books. The ‘first complete edition,’ edited by Andrew Eburne, who restored
passages that had been edited out by A J A Symons. A new introduction by Andrew Eburne
and a new preface by John Bayley. This copy inscribed by the editor: ‘ “Give all, gain all”
/ With best wishes / Andrew Eburne.’ Fine copy in fine dustjacket.
£40
31
23.
CORVO, Frederick Rolfe Baron
Hubert’s Arthur
1935
Cassell. FIRST EDITION. An exceptionally fine copy in a pristine dustjacket, with a
small (2 cm) bookseller’s label at the foot of the front pastedown endpaper and a very few
unobtrusive spots of foxing at paper extremities. Woolf B16.
£175
32
24.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
The Songs of Meleager
1937
The First Edition Club. FIRST EDITION. One of only 750 copies. A fine copy, lacking
the scarce cellophane dustjacket. Small book label of Alice Peel on front pastedown
endpaper. Woolf B17.
together with
Several items of ephemera relating to Symons’s First Edition Club, including a printed
membership list boasting such names as Bertie Stopford, Thomas Wise, Christopher
Millard and (most gratifyingly Firbankian of all) a Miss Freda Flesh. Also included is the
prospectus for the Club’s forthcoming book by Sir Ambrose Heal, an attendee at one of the
1929 Corvine Banquets.
£90
33
25.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
Letters to Grant Richards
1952
The Peacocks Press. FIRST EDITION. Number 68 in an edition of 200 copies. A fine
copy. Woolf A13.
together with
Several items of ephemera: the British Museum copyright receipt for the book; a postcardsized announcement card from the publisher, George Sims; a later paper sheet printed in
red, announcing that only 50 copies remained; and the ‘Postscript’ insert intended by Sims
to forestall any possible legal action.
34
£160
26.
CORVO, Fr Rolfe Baron
The Cardinal Prefect of Propaganda
1957
Nicholas Vane. FIRST EDITION. An out of series copy in an edition of 310 copies. A
fine copy, lacking the scarce plain paper dustjacket. Inscribed on the front free endpaper
by the editor: ‘For Dennis Rhodes, / with very many thanks and / good wishes from / Cecil
Woolf / Nov 29th 1957.’
together with
A postcard-sized announcement card from the publisher.
£150
35
27.
CORVO, Baron
A Letter from Baron Corvo to John Lane
1958
The Peacocks Press. FIRST EDITION. Number 5 in an edition of only 30 copies. Some
spots of foxing at the extremities and some unobtrusive discolouration of the title page.
This was formerly the copy of the collector Anthony Reid. Woolf A15.
36
£150
28.
ROLFE, Fr (Baron Corvo)
Nicholas Crabbe
1958
Chatto & Windus. FIRST EDITION. The UK issue. A fine copy in a fine dustjacket.
Woolf A16a.
together with
A postcard-sized announcement card from the publisher.
£40
37
29.
ROLFE, Fr (Baron Corvo)
Nicholas Crabbe
1958
New Directions. FIRST EDITION. The American issue. A fine copy in a fine dustjacket.
Loosely inserted is a publisher’s slip accompanying this review copy. Woolf A16a..
38
£40
30.
ROLFE, Fr (Baron Corvo)
Nicholas Crabbe
1960
Chatto & Windus. Limited issue, with an Appendix consisting of 32 letters from Sholto
Douglas to Frederick Rolfe. Number 167 in an edition of 200 copies. A fine copy in a
cellophane dustjacket and cloth-covered slipcase. Woolf A16b.
£80
39
31.
ROLFE, Frederick
A Letter to the Marquis de Ruvigny
1959
Tragara Press. One of only 2 copies printed; the other copy is in the Library of Congress.
A very early and much sought after Tragara Press item (see Steven Halliwell, Fifty Years of
Hand-Printing: A Bibliography of the Tragara Press, Rivendale, 2005, page 129). A fine
copy. Not in Woolf.
together with
A holograph letter from Alan Anderson recounting the circumstances surrounding this
item’s printing.
40
£750
32.
CORVO, Fr Rolfe, Baron
The Centenary Edition
1959 - 1962
41
42
Prospectus
1958
Nicholas Vane. A finely-printed 8-page prospectus setting out the scheme for an edition to mark
the centenary of Corvo’s birth and listing the ten proposed volumes, of which only three were
published.
together with
Letters to C H C Pirie-Gordon
1959
Nicholas Vane. Number 210 in an edition of only 330 copies. A fine copy, lacking the scarce
plain paper dustjacket. Woolf A17a.
together with
Letters to Leonard Moore
1960
A proof copy, with the book label of Timothy d’Arch Smith on the inside front cover. Woolf
A19a.
together with
Letters to Leonard Moore
1960
Nicholas Vane. Number 183 in an edition of only 290 copies. A fine copy, lacking the scarce
plain paper dustjacket. This copy inscribed by the editor: ‘This copy is for / my quasi-Venetian
friend, / Leslie Stanley, / with delight on both sides, / from the Editor, / Cecil Woolf / London,
June 25th 1965.’ Woolf A17a.
together with
Letters to R M Dawkins
1962
A postcard-sized announcement card from the publisher.
together with
Letters to R M Dawkins
1962
A proof copy, with the book label of Timothy d’Arch Smith on the inside front cover. Woolf
A21a.
together with
Letters to R M Dawkins
1962
Nicholas Vane. Number 86 in an edition of only 290 copies. A fine copy, lacking the scarce
plain paper dustjacket. Woolf A21a.
£440
43
33.
CORVO, Baron
The Letters of Baron Corvo to Kenneth Grahame
1962
The Peacocks Press. A brown cardboard folder containing loose proof sheets of this
publication, inscribed by the printer: ‘To Robert Scoble, / these incomplete proofs / from
Alan Anderson / 26.ii.97’. Woolf A20.
44
£40
34.
ROLFE, Fr (Baron Corvo)
Don Renato
1963
Chatto & Windus. FIRST PUBLISHED EDITION. Number 17 in an edition of only
200 copies. A fine copy in the cellophane dustjacket and gold paper-covered slipcase.
Inscribed by the editor on the date of publication: ‘For / C.R. Dawes Esqre / ‒ whose
skirmish with the Author / of this strange book / in the pages of “Notes and Queries” /
will indeed long be remembered ‒ / with warmest regards / from the Editor / Cecil Woolf /
London, Nov. 21st 1963.’ Woolf A8b.
Charles Reginald Dawes (1879 - 1964) was a close friend of Montague Summers and a
noted expert on erotica, his fine collection of which he bequeathed to the British Library.
£180
45
35.
ROLFE, Fr (Baron Corvo)
Don Renato
1963
Chatto & Windus. FIRST PUBLISHED EDITION. A fine copy of the ordinary issue, in a
fine dustjacket. Woolf A8c.
together with
A proof copy, lacking (in common with all surviving proof copies) the Corvo device on the
title page, and two items of ephemera, giving advance notice of this edition to a prospective
buyer: a printed Don Renato postcard from Cecil Woolf Booksellers stamped on 23 May
1962 (18 months prior to publication), and a letter signed by Woolf on 6 November 1963.
46
£80
36.
ROLFE, Frederick William
Without Prejudice
1963
Privately printed. FIRST EDITION. One of 600 copies. A pristine copy in a pristine
salmon paper dustjacket, and in original printer’s delivery box. As new. Woolf A23.
£140
47
37.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
A Letter to Claud
1964
Privately printed. FIRST EDITION. This is one of 65 copies with the Rising Line Marque
watermark, in a total edition of 134 copies. This copy belonged to Anthony Reid, who has
annotated the front free endpaper in light pencil. There is some unobtrusive foxing to the
extremities. The edition was overseen by the Corvine scholar Clarence Andrews of the
University of Iowa (see Item 85), and printed by Harold Yahnke and the legendary handprinter Harry Duncan (1916 - 1997). Woolf A24.
Claude Hamilton Rolfe (1899 - 1949) was the first child and only son of Frederick Rolfe’s
brother Percy. He was only three years old when this letter was written. It is not known
why his uncle spelt his name ‘Claud.’
48
£250
38.
CORVO, Frederick Baron
A Letter to Claud
1975
Privately printed. SECOND EDITION. This edition was published on 19 September 1975,
overseen by the Corvine scholar Donald Weeks, who has inscribed the inside back cover:
‘A LETTER TO CLAUD / facsimile edition / limited to 50 copies / Donald Weeks.’
£100
49
39.
Rolfe, Frederick
The Venice Letters
1965
Andre Deutsch. The Summer 1965 issue (Number 5) of the journal Art and Literature: An
International Review. The first publication of full transcripts of the Venice Letters, with an
important introduction by Woolf, containing material later cut from his 1974 trade edition
(see Item 44). Woolf C122.
together with
Two ephemeral items: a blue foolscap ‘Advance Information’ sheet from Andre Deutsch
Ltd and Cecil Woolf Booksellers foreshadowing the Art and Literature Venice Letters
selection; and a finely-printed prospectus from Art and Literature announcing the Venice
Letters issue. This prospectus also foreshadows a study (which never eventuated) by
Pamela Grieve of Rolfe’s paintings and photography.
50
£100
40.
Millard, Christopher
Five Letters and a Catalogue
1983
Victim Press. FIRST EDITION. Number 111 in an edition of 158 copies. A facsimile
of Millard’s 1926 catalogue (Woolf B10.1) which marked the first time that extracts from
the Venice Letters had appeared in print. ‘It is impossible,’ wrote Millard with barely
concealed relish, ‘ to do more than hint at the amazing scenes of debauchery described in
detail in some of these letters,’ With a prefatory note by Victor Hall and an introduction by
Timothy d’Arch Smith, who has signed the title page.
£50
51
41.
Rolfe, Frederick
The Venice Letters
1987
Cecil Woolf Publishers. SECOND EDITION, With Illustrations by the Author. Number 72
in a limited edition of 100 copies printed on Mohawk Superfine Text Soft White Eggshell
paper. The text is that of Woolf’s 1974 edition (see Item 44). A fine copy in a cellophane
dustjacket.
52
£80
42.
CORVO, Frederick Rolfe, Baron
Letters to James Walsh
1972
Bertram Rota (Publishing) Ltd. FIRST EDITION. Number 323 in an edition of 500
copies. A fine copy in a fine justjacket.
£40
53
43.
CORVO, Frederick W Rolfe, Baron
Ballade of Boys Bathing
1972
Officina Mauritiana. FIRST SEPARATE EDITION. Number 57 in an edition of 200
copies. A four-page pamphlet reprinting a Rolfe poem which had first appeared in 1890.
Printed by Guido Morris, ‘an admirer of that grandiose eccentric.’ A fine copy in a fine
printed envelope.
together with
A fine copy of the ‘first public edition of 100 copies’ of the Michael Bridge booklet Guido
Morris and The Latin Press in Saint Ives 1946 - 1953 (2005) a survey of the life and
work of Douglas ‘Guido’ Morris (1910 - 1980), including the origin of the distinctive
Gordon Craig flower basket device Morris used here and in his printing of Letters to Grant
Richards.
54
£50
44.
CORVO, Fr Rolfe, Baron,
The Armed Hands
Collected Poems
The Venice Letters
1974
Cecil & Amelia Woolf. FIRST COLLECTED EDITIONS. These are copies of the three
‘Standard issue’ volumes. All three are fine copies in fine dustjackets, except that the copy
of The Armed Hands has several tiny spots of foxing along the head. Woolf A26a and
A27a.
£90
55
45.
CORVO, Fr Rolfe, Baron,
The Armed Hands
Collected Poems
The Venice Letters
1974
Cecil & Amelia Woolf. FIRST COLLECTED EDITIONS. These are fine copies of all
three limited issue volumes, each in a fine slipcase. The copy of The Armed Hands is
number 29 in an edition of 200 copies bound in red buckram and in a red slipcase. The
copy of Collected Poems is number 58 in an edition of 200 copies bound in green buckram
and in a green slipcase. The copy of The Venice Letters is number 92 in an edition of 200
copies bound in blue buckram and in a blue slipcase. Woolf A26b and A27b.
£240
56
46.
CORVO, Frederick William Rolfe, Baron
Letters to Harry Bainbridge
1976
Enitharmon Press. FIRST EDITION. Number XV in an edition of XLV copies, one of 45
specially bound copies. A fine copy in a fine thick cellophane dustjacket.
£60
57
47.
ROLFE, Frederick
The Freeing of the Soul or The Seven Degrees
1995
The first publication of the opening chapter of Rolfe’s unfinished novel of ancient Venice,
edited with an introduction by Andrew Eburne. This is a copy of the Volume 38:4 (1995)
issue of the journal English Literature in Transition 1880-1920, with a new illustration (by
Stuart Patterson) of Rolfe in profile and an introduction to the Rolfe chapter by Andrew
Eburne (see Item 22) entitled ‘Frederick Rolfe’s Last Novel: An Unpublished Fragment.’
Fine.
£10
58
48.
ROLFE, Frederick
Three Tales of Venice
2006
Privately printed. This was one of Callum James’s very earliest finely printed books,
and remains one of his most accomplished. The book reprints three short stories which
originally appeared in Blackwood’s Magazine in 1913. The stories were reprinted by
George Sims in 1950. James has himself contributed a short introduction to his edition.
Number 1 in an edition of 50 copies, this copy signed by James. Pristine.
£50
59
PART 2
BOOKS AND EPHEMERA
RELATING TO
FREDERICK ROLFE
BARON CORVO
49.
BAINBRIDGE, Harry
Twice Seven
1933
George Routledge & Sons. FIRST EDITION. Contains a long and informative chapter
entitled ‘Corvo the Enigma.’ A fine copy in the scarce dustjacket with just a few chips.
Woolf B13.
£40
62
50.
BENKOVITZ, Miriam J
Frederick Rolfe: Baron Corvo
1977
A good copy of the first American edition, inscribed by her censorious fellow Corvo
biographer Donald Weeks: ‘To Anthony [Reid?], This, then, is the “corrected” American
edition.’ Weeks has also typed corrections on a number of loose slips of paper and inserted
each of them between the pages they purport to correct.
£30
63
51.
BENKOVITZ, Miriam J
Typed Letter signed by Miriam Benkovitz
1977
A two-page typed letter dated 17 July 1977 and signed by the Corvo biographer Miriam
Benkovitz (1911 - 1986).
Benkovitz discusses the errors in her book Frederick Rolfe: Baron Corvo, admitting that
she perhaps ‘seemed more outraged than I am’ at Corvo’s sexual escapades in Venice. ‘I
agree with you,’ she tells her correspondent, ‘that it’s better than the Firbank book. I
learned from that and besides, for Corvo I had more - much more - material. And I suspect
Corvo was a more interesting human being than Firbank, anyway. But Firbank is the
better writer.’
64
£30
52.
BENSON, Robert Hugh
The Sentimentalists
1906
Pitman & Sons. FIRST EDITION. A good, bright copy, with a faded spine and some
foxing to the fore-edge.
Hugh Benson’s second novel and Frederick Rolfe’s first appearance in the fiction of another
writer. Rolfe is one constituent of the central character ‘Chris Dell.’ Ronald Firbank later
parodied this novel in his story ‘Lady Appledore’s Mésalliance.’
together with
BENSON, Robert Hugh
The Conventionalists
1908
Hutchinson & Co. SECOND EDITION. The sequel to The Sentimentalists. This copy
should be ashamed of itself.
£40
65
53.
CENTENARY ESSAYS
Cecil Woolf and Brocard Sewell, editors
Corvo, 1860 ‒ 1960
1961
St Albert’s Press. FIRST EDITION. A pristine copy in a pristine cellophane dustjacket.
Rarely found in such superb condition. Number 226 in an edition of 300 copies. Signed by
the editors. Woolf B25a.
together with
Two ephemeral items: a finely-printed four-page prospectus from the St Albert’s
Press, foreshadowing 200 copies in the limited edition and 12 specials; and a roneoed
marketing announcement and order form on cream paper from Cecil Woolf (Booksellers),
foreshadowing 300 copies in the limited edition and 15 specials. In the event 389 copies
were printed: 300 numbered, 75 unnumbered and 14 specials.
together with
Offprints of four of the essays in Corvo, 1860 ‒ 1960, by Bertram Korn, Donald Weeks,
Alexandra Zaina and Sylvester Houédard. Each is one of 50 offprints only, and in pristine
condition.
£150
66
54.
CENTENARY ESSAYS
Cecil Woolf and Brocard Sewell
The Clerk Without a Benefice
1964
St Albert’s Press. FIRST EDITION THUS. A separate hardback edition of the essay
by Woolf and Sewell in Corvo, 1860 ‒ 1960. Number 20 in an edition of 150 copies. A
pristine copy in a glassine dustjacket and a custom burgundy slipcase. The colophon
has 1964, but Woolf states on page 133 of his Bibliography that this limited edition
reimpression was issued in 1965.
together with
A roneoed marketing announcement and order form on pink paper from Cecil Woolf
(Booksellers), foreshadowing publication on 13 April 1965.
£60
67
55.
CENTENARY ESSAYS
Cecil Woolf and Brocard Sewell, editors
New Quests for Corvo
1965
Icon Books. A fine copy of the paperback edition of Corvo, 1860 ‒ 1960. . Woolf B25b.
together with
A marketing announcement on light blue paper from Cecil & Amelia Woolf, foreshadowing
publication in March 1965. In the event the book was published a month later.
68
£20
56.
CENTENARY EXHIBITION
Cecil Woolf and others
Frederick William Rolfe: A Catalogue Prepared on
the Occasion of a Loan Exhibition at St
Marylebone Central Public Library, Marylebone
Road, London, N.W.1 to Mark the Centenary of his
Birth in 1860
1960
A fine copy of the roneoed exhibition catalogue, inscribed: ‘For Alan Anderson, with very
many thanks for his co-operation, and with best wishes, from Cecil Woolf.’
together with
A pristine copy of the large paper exhibition poster, measuring 25cm by 38cm, inscribed
‘Alan Anderson from Cecil Woolf’ in the top left hand corner; and a white postcard printed
in purple, permitting entry to the 19 October 1960 private view, and inscribed in blue ink
on the reverse: ‘Alan Anderson from Cecil Woolf.’
£40
69
57.
CHAMBERS, Robert William
Outsiders: An Outline
1900
Grant Richards. This is a copy of the second UK printing, published in May 1900, one
month after the first. This first UK edition is now extremely scarce in any printing. This
copy has been shoddily rebound, but is internally excellent.
This novel by the prolific American writer R W Chambers gave Frederick Rolfe the idea
for Nicholas Crabbe. Rolfe wrote to Richards on 19 February 1906, to say that Nicholas
Crabbe was ‘quite as good as R W Chambers’s Outsiders, which made me write it.’
70
£20
58.
CLARK, Gavin, and Nicholas Jolly
The Chap Almanac: An Esoterick Yearbook for the
Decadent Gentleman
2002
4th Estate. FIRST EDITION. Published under the noms de plume ‘Gustav Temple’ and
‘Vic Darkwood,’ this is an amusing compendium of oddball characters and eccentric
pursuits. The article ‘Baron Corvo’ appears on pages 84-86.
together with
Issue 4 (2001) of the journal The Chap, edited by ‘Gustav Temple.’ The short story
‘Corvo,’ set in 1911 and describing a fictitious occasion on which Sholto Douglas
accompanied the narrators to call on Rolfe at his Venetian palazzo, appears on pages 14-17.
One of the article’s illustrations is a drawing of St Winefride’s statue in Holywell with ‒ a
nice touch ‒ Rolfe’s signature raven at her feet.
£20
71
59.
CORVINE BANQUETS
True Recitals
1929
Fine copies in protective glassine dustjackets of A True Recital of the Procedure of the first
Banquet held by the Corvine Society: June 27th, 1929, at the Ambassador Club and A True
Recital of the Procedure of the first Banquet held by the Corvine Society: December 12th,
1929, at the Ambassador Club. The texts of these commemorative booklets were reprinted
as Appendix II of the 1955 fourth edition of Symons’s The Quest for Corvo (see Item 80).
The Corvine Society was founded by Shane Leslie, A J A Symons and Maundy Gregory, ‘to
honour the memory of Frederick Rolfe Baron Corvo, to recommend his writings, and to
explain away his life.’ It is still flourishing.
72
£200
60.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Jeanette W Gilsdorf and Nicholas A Salerno
Frederick W Rolfe, Baron Corvo: An Annotated
Bibliography of Writings About Him
1980
A fine copy of this excellent bibliographical resource, compiled by two academics at the
Arizona State University. A comprehensive secondary bibliography, it takes up an entire
issue (Volume 23 Number 1) of the journal English Literature in Transition. The contents
of each secondary item are intelligently and informatively described.
£30
73
61.
THE FAILIURE PRESS
Christopher Martin and Paul de Fortis
The Failiure Press: A Journal of Ideas
1975
A rare surviving copy of one issue of this roneoed journal, the brainchild of Christopher
Martin and Paul de Fortis, with its inexplicable misspelling of ‘failure’ in its title.
This number contains two Rolfe-related articles: one in which Donald Weeks takes
characteristically ill-tempered potshots at Cecil Woolf, and another in which Brocard
Sewell defends Woolf’s scholarship.
Stephen Fry wrote in his 1997 autobiography Moab is My Washpot: ‘It was in King’s Lynn
that I swam into the orbit of a most extraordinary circle of intellectuals who met regularly
in the bar of a small hotel and discussed avidly the works of Frederick Rolfe, the infamous
Baron Corvo...This group regularly produced a magazine called The Failiure Press (the
spelling is deliberate) to which I contributed a regular crossword.’ Unfortunately, this
issue contains no Fry crossword.
74
£30
62.
GREGORY, Maundy
Gerald Macmillan
Honours for Sale: The Strange Story of Maundy
Gregory
1954
The Richards Press. A fine copy of the second printing, in a fine price-clipped dustjacket.
This biography, written by Dennis Moylan under the pseudonym ‘Gerald Macmillan,’
contains details of Gregory’s association with A J A Symons, with whom he inaugurated the
Corvine Banquets in 1929.
together with
Tom Cullen
Maundy Gregory: Purveyor of Honours
1974
The Bodley Head. FIRST EDITION. A fine copy in a fine dustjacket. This biography
unveiled further details of Gregory’s Corvine activities.
£40
75
63.
HUNTER-BLAIR, The Rt Rev Sir David
‘More Light on Baron Corvo’
1934
This sympathetic first-hand description of Hunter-Blair’s dealings with Rolfe appears in the
May 1934 number of The London Mercury. Near fine, with a faded spine.
In the same number is another article entitled ‘Baron Corvo’ by Mary Butts (1890-1937),
wife of the very early Corvo collector William ‘Gabriel’ Atkin (1897-1937), an artist
friend of Theo Bartholomew and sometime lover of Siegfried Sassoon. Butts takes an
unsympathetic line on Rolfe, concluding that ‘few tears will be shed for him.’
76
£20
64.
JOHNSON, Pamela Hansford
The Unspeakable Skipton
1959
Macmillan. FIRST EDITION. Near fine (light unobtrusive foxing to endpapers) in slightly
rubbed dustjacket.
The book’s protagonist, Daniel Skipton, shares Rolfe’s temperament and survives in Bruges
(like Venice, a city of canals) by sponging off his fellow expatriates. The author writes in
her prefatory Note: ‘Anyone familiar with the life of Frederick Rolfe will detect some of my
sources.’
£30
77
65.
KORN, Bertram
A Corvo Library
1963
Privately printed. One of 400 copies. A fine copy. This informative catalogue is a great
credit to the enterprise and scholarship of Cecil Woolf, whose idea it was to commemorate
Rabbi Korn’s impressive Corvo collection in this way. Woolf B27.
together with
A roneoed marketing announcement from Cecil Woolf (Booksellers) that A Corvo Library
was ‘just off the press.’
78
£40
66.
LESLIE, Shane
The Cantab
1926
Chatto & Windus. FIRST EDITION. Two copies of this book: the first edition and the
revised edition. These are working copies only but valuable to the scholar as they are
heavily and interestingly annotated. The copy of the first edition of Leslie’s roman à clef
has a pencilled key to the characters on its front pastedown endpaper. Rolfe is a major
character in the novel, under the name ‘Baron Falco.’ The first edition of The Cantab had
to be withdrawn after objections to its scenes of ‘sexual reality.’ The copy here of the
revised edition has pencil indications of five long replacement passages.
together with
A very good copy of The Anglo-Catholic (1929), the third book in the Edward Stornington
trilogy, following The Oppidan (1922) and The Cantab (1926). Inscribed: ‘To plain Mrs
Lowther, the only one, from the author as a night drug (the book), Shane Leslie, Xmas
1936.’ Sybil Lonsdale married Lancelot Lowther in 1923, and was ‘plain Mrs Lowther’
until she became Countess of Lonsdale in 1944 upon her husband’s succession to his
earldom. Also included is a good copy of Leslie’s autobiography Long Shadows (1966),
which seeks to mislead by hinting that the author’s interest in Rolfe was no more than
fleeting.
£40
79
67.
LUKE, Peter
Hadrian VII
1968
Andre Deutsch. This was an ‘edition for the general reader,’ having been preceded by
publication in the magazine Plays and Players, in a book of Plays of the Year, and in an
acting edition (details may be found on page 49 of Woolf’s Bibliography). Peter Luke was
the son of Rolfe’s onetime collaborator Sir Harry Luke. A fine copy in a fine dustjacket.
together with
Peter Luke
Hadrian VII
1969
A fine copy of the first American edition, published by Alfred A Knopf with an introduction
by Herbert Weinstock, reproducing much of his introduction to the 1953 third American
impression of Rolfe’s novel Hadrian the Seventh (see Item 13).
80
£40
68.
PHOTOGRAPHY
[Joseph Gleeson White?]
‘The Nude in Photography’
1893
This unsigned article in the 15 June 1893 number of The Studio has been attributed by
Timothy d’Arch Smith to Joseph Gleeson White. Two of its illustrations are captioned
‘From a photograph by Baron Corvo,’ and he is also given credit for another photograph
some fifty pages later. This volume, containing all issues of The Studio for 1893 and 1894,
is attractively and sturdily bound in contemporary leather and cloth, with gold art nouveau
lettering on the spine. There is foxing on many pages in the volume, though not on the
pages of relevance to Rolfe. Woolf C17.
£80
81
69.
PHOTOGRAPHY
Donald Rosenthal
The Photographs of Frederick Rolfe Baron Corvo
1860-1913
2008
Asphodel Editions. FIRST EDITION. Number 11 in an edition of 250 copies, this being
one of only 50 slipcased and numbered ‘special issue’ copies with lettering on the front
cover and spine larger than on the ordinary issue. This was the first compilation of the
photographic works of Frederick Rolfe. Fine as issued. The book went out of print quickly
after publication.
82
£160
70.
PHOTOGRAPHY
Callum James, editor
The Christchurch Album
2010
Callum James Books. FIRST EDITION. Number 2 in an edition of 70 copies, this copy
inscribed by the editor. A mint copy of this first publication of the photographs Rolfe took
of the White family in the early 1890s, carefully reproduced by Callum James, who writes
the introduction.
£40
83
71.
ROTH, David
Desiderata
1954 - 1955
Four articles about Frederick Rolfe in David Roth’s publication Desiderata:
‘Frederick Rolfe: Some Notes and Queries’
Article by Cecil Woolf in Desiderata, 8 January 1954 number, inscribed in blue ink: ‘For
Alan Anderson with best wishes from Cecil Woolf, Jan 13th 1954.’
‘A Corvo Collection’
Article by David Roth, under his pseudonym ‘X.Y.Z,’ in Desiderata, 4 February 1955
number.
‘Corvo in French’
Article by Alexandra Zaina in Desiderata, 18 February 1955 number, inscribed in black
ink: ‘With all good wishes - Alexandra Zaina.’
‘Is It A Corvo Relic?’
Article by David Roth, under his pseudonym ‘X.Y.Z,’ in Desiderata, 3 June 1955 number,
inscribed by Roth in blue ink.
84
£40
72.
ST WINEFRIDE’S WELL
Three books on Rolfe’s years in Holywell
2002 - 2009
Eric Rowan and Carolyn Stewart
An Elusive Tradition: Art and Society in Wales, 1870-1950
2002
together with
John A Shaffer
Winifred’s Well
2008
together with
T W Pritchard
St Winefride, Her Holy Well and the Jesuit Mission, c.650-1930
2009
All three books are fine in fine dustjackets
£40
85
73.
THE SAN MICHELE LOCULUS
Three ephemeral items relating to Frederick
Rolfe’s final resting place in Venice
A small (10.0 cm by 7.3 cm) black and white photograph of Rolfe’s loculus on the
cemetery island of San Michele, taken sometime in the 1950s by the wealthy Argentine
publisher Don Patricio Gannon, who took an interest in Rolfe in the latter’s role as a Yellow
Book contributor. Alan Anderson has written in pencil on the reverse: ‘Photograph taken
by Don Patricio Gannon.’
together with
1950s Cemetery Location Chart. A printed ‘Location of Burial’ form (11 cm by 16 cm)
issued by the Commune of Venice, with a plan of the San Michele cemetery island. Details
for ‘Rolfo Federico’ have been entered in black ink, and the form has been dated 6 April
1956.
together with
1970s Cemetery Location Chart. A photocopy (as called for). By the 1970s the cemetery
attendants grew weary of giving directions to the tombs of the famous. They enlarged
the plan to A4 size, typed onto it the names of the nine most visited tombs, with arrows
pointing to their respective locations, and handed out photocopies to visitors. The nine
names include Stravinsky, Pound, Diaghilev and of course Rolfe.
86
£20
74.
SEWELL, Brocard
Frederick Rolfe and Others
1961
St Albert’s Press. FIRST EDITION. Number 235 in an edition of 450 copies. A pristine
copy of this 40-page booklet, containing much Rolfe-related material. Woolf B26.
together with
A printed green postcard-sized marketing announcement from St Albert’s Press, stating that
proceeds from the sale of Frederick Rolfe and Others would go to ‘the Aylesford Review
Maintenance Fund.’
together with
Rolfe’s poem ‘A Mistake (from the Italian of Baron Corvo)’ copied in holograph by
Anthony d’Offay in blue ink on a sheet of white paper. Annotated in pencil on the reverse
by Alan Anderson: ‘transcription made by Anthony d’Offay.’ The poem was printed in
Frederick Rolfe and Others for the first time since its original appearance fifty years before
in John Gambril Nicholson’s A Garland of Ladslove.
£80
87
75.
SIMS, George
A Catalogue of Letters, Manuscript Papers and
Books of Frederick Rolfe
1949
The scarcest of Sims’s Rolfe-related catalogues, listing an extensive archive of letters
written by Rolfe during his time in Holywell. Generous quotations and four illustrations.
The letters had been owned by A J A Symons and used by his brother Julian to write his
1945 article ‘The Battle of Holywell’ in The Saturday Book. The entire collection was sold
to David Roth and is now in the Martyr Worthy Collection at Columbia University Library.
Fine. Woolf B19.
88
£40
76.
SIMS, George
A Collection of Catalogues
1967 - 1986
23 catalogues issued by G F Sims (Rare Books) from his bookroom in the village of Hurst
in Berkshire. The catalogues are in excellent condition, but many of the staples have rusted.
They were finely printed by Robert Stockwell in London and later by Alan Anderson in
Edinburgh.
Each Sims catalogue lists several items of breathtaking importance and rarity, with a
particular emphasis upon manuscript and association material. His Corvo finds were
legendary: one of only six surviving copies of Don Renato, inscribed by A J A Symons; a
copy of Hadrian the Seventh inscribed by Corvo to his brother; the suppressed appendix
to Chronicles of the House of Borgia; the holograph manuscript of A Bull Against the
Enemy of the Anglican Race; manuscript pages from Hubert’s Arthur; a copy of Chronicles
inscribed by Corvo to his parents; holograph letters to the literary agent J B Pinker; and
many more
£100
89
77.
SYMONS, A J A
The Quest for Corvo
1934
Cassell. FIRST EDITION. A near fine (tiny spots of foxing) copy of the iconic biography,
in a fine price-clipped dustjacket. Inscribed by A J A Symons to the Swift scholar
and Corvine Banquet attendee Harold Williams: ‘Harold Williams / with the cordial /
salutations of / his friend the / author.’ Woolf B14a.
90
£160
78.
SYMONS, A J A
The Quest for Corvo
1940
Cassell. SECOND EDITION. A remarkable surviving copy of the first printing of the
Penguin edition. This copy is internally fine, with the outer edges of all pages embrowned
and some rubbing and chipping to the extremities. Woolf B14b.
Although paper was sternly rationed during World War II, Penguin Books was the company
least affected, because the pro-rata paper allocations were based on sales in the immediate
pre-war period, precisely the time when Penguins had enjoyed huge popularity. The first
print run of The Quest for Corvo paperback was 50,000 copies on 5 November 1940. By
January 1941 these copies were ‘practically exhausted.’ The number of servicemen who
read The Quest for Corvo would have been in the hundreds of thousands. Some copies
would have been lost in air raids, of course, and others at sea, but each copy that survived
would have had quite a few readers. Demand was such that there was a second printing of
30,000 copies in July 1941 and a third of 60,000 copies in May 1944. Sales slowed after
the war, and not until September 1950 did a fourth printing of 30,000 copies appear.
£20
91
79.
SYMONS, A J A
The Quest for Corvo
1952
Cassell. THIRD EDITION. The Folio Society edition, in a former owner’s custom
blue slipcase. A near fine copy, with spots of foxing on the free endpapers. This edition
contained some newly-discovered photographs and a valuable Appendix by Julian Symons
entitled ‘Rolfe at Holywell.’ Woolf B14c.
together with
A mint copy of the May-June 1952 issue of the Folio Society’s marketing magazine The
Folio, featuring a first-hand account of Rolfe by E G Hardy’s son Arthur, who as a child
had been fascinated by Rolfe.
92
£60
80.
SYMONS, A J A
The Quest for Corvo
1955
Cassell. FOURTH EDITION. A near fine copy, with tiny spots of foxing on the free
endpapers, in a fine dustjacket. Woolf B14d.
This edition is noteworthy for its Appendices, one reprinting Rolfe’s The Bull Against
the Enemy of the Anglican Race, and the other reprinting the ‘true recitals’ of the 1929
Corvine Banquets.
£40
93
81.
SYMONS, A J A
‘Emin Governor of Equatoria’
1927
A pristine copy of the menu of the Sette of Odd Volumes dinner on 22 November 1927, at
which Symons gave a talk on the African adventurer Emin Pasha (vere Eduard Schnitzer).
Tipped onto the menu cover is a printed drawing by the caricaturist R T Gould of Symons
himself as Emin Pasha. It was the success of this talk which persuaded Symons that
biography was his true literary métier.
94
£30
82.
SYMONS, A J A
‘Frederick Baron Corvo’
1928
Volume 1 Number 2 (July 1928) of Desmond MacCarthy’s journal Life and Letters,
containing this article, an amended version of Symons’s talk on Baron Corvo to the Sette of
Odd Volumes on 23 November 1926. Near fine with very slightly embrowned backstrip.
£10
95
83.
SYMONS, A J A
Essays and Biographies
1969
Cassell. FIRST EDITION. A collection of A J A Symons’s essays, edited by his brother. A
near fine copy, with a few tiny spots of foxing on the fore-edge, in a fine dustjacket.
96
£30
84.
SYMONS, Julian
A J A Symons: His Life and Speculations
1950
Eyre & Spottiswoode. FIRST EDITION. A fine copy, with a tiny neat bookseller’s label
at the foot of the front pastedown endpaper, in a fine, slightly rubbed and price-clipped
dustjacket.
£40
97
85.
UNIVERSITY THESIS
Clarence Andrews
Raging in the Dark: An Examination of the Life
and Letters of Frederick William Rolfe, Baron Corvo
1963
Photocopy of Andrews’s PhD thesis, University of Iowa. Andrews was the first mainstream
academic to write a doctoral dissertation on Frederick Rolfe. (See also Item 37)
98
£20
86.
UNIVERSITY THESIS
Alan Munton
Frederick Rolfe: The Making of The Desire and
Pursuit of the Whole
1969
Photocopy of Munton’s MA thesis, University of Birmingham. This is a groundbreaking
study of Rolfe’s Venetian novel, still stimulating and still awaiting publication.
£20
99
87.
UNIVERSITY THESIS
Gordon Pryce Jones
The Autobiographical Novels of Frederick Rolfe
1971
Photocopy of Jones’s PhD thesis, University of London. An impressively thorough and
detailed analysis of Rolfe’s autobiographical novels. Jones’s meticulous scholarship is still
fresh and relevant, and this work truly deserves commercial publication.
together with
Fine copies of two issues of the journal English Literature in Transition 1880-1920, each
containing an article arising from Jones’s thesis research: ‘The Date of Composition of
Frederick Rolfe’s Hadrian the Seventh,’ in the journal’s Volume 16 Number 1 (1973), and
‘The Date of Composition of Frederick Rolfe’s Nicholas Crabbe,’ in the journal’s Volume
23 Number 2 (1980).
100
£30
88.
UNIVERSITY THESIS
François Vergné
Frederick W Rolfe, Baron Corvo: Autobiographie
et Quête Formelle
1993
Two-volume copy of Vergné’s Thèse pour le Doctorat, Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle
Paris III.
£20
101
89.
VIRGO, Eustace
‘E V de Fontmell’
Forbidden Marches
1929
The Scholartis Press. FIRST EDITION, first printing. The first of the three novels written
by Eustace Virgo in old age. Virgo, who used the nom de plume ‘E V de Fontmell’ because
he had been born at Fontmell Magna in Dorset, was introduced to Frederick Rolfe by Hugh
Benson. This is one of only 500 copies of the first edition, internally pristine but with some
light marks on the covers, and without a dustjacket.
102
£30
90.
VIRGO, Eustace
‘E V de Fontmell’
Honour Lost, All Lost: A Mystery of Modern Rome
1929
The Scholartis Press. FIRST EDITION, first printing. Virgo’s second novel. This is one
of only 500 copies of the first edition, very good but without a dustjacket. The book is
dedicated to Virgo’s favourite pupil and the (unrequited) love of his life, Francesco Ruspoli,
who was once ‒ partly through Virgo’s agency ‒ offered the throne of Albania. Inscribed in
brown ink on the front free endpaper: ‘A.A.E.M.K. / with / every affectionate wish / from /
The Author.’
£40
103
91.
VIRGO, Eustace
‘E V de Fontmell’
Life at a Venture
1930
Eric Partridge. FIRST EDITION. The third of Virgo’s novels, an autobiography so thinly
disguised that it hardly deserves the name of roman à clef. Virgo describes his dealings
with Rolfe, whom he disliked and who is named Baron Corvo throughout. This is one
of only 500 copies of the first edition, very good with light pencilled notes by a previous
owner, but without a dustjacket.
104
£60
92.
WEEKS, Donald
An Intrusion Upon Eternity
1961
Adagio: The Private Press of Leonard Bahr. One of 150 unnumbered copies. A fine copy.
Weeks’s attempt at a Toto story of his own.
£30
105
93.
WEEKS, Donald
Corvo
1971
Michael Joseph. FIRST EDITION. A fine copy in a fine dustjacket.
together with
Donald Weeks
Corvo
1971
Michael Joseph. A near fine copy of the uncorrected proof, signed on the title page by
Donald Weeks.
106
£40
94.
WEEKS, Donald
Christmas Card
1974
A reproduction on yellow cardboard of what Weeks describes as an ‘unrecorded painting
by Rolfe, c.1889.’ This painting, the whereabouts of which are unknown, has never been
reproduced in any other publication.
£40
107
95.
WEEKS, Donald
Typed Letter signed by Donald Weeks
1976
This two-page foolscap letter, dated 17 August 1976 and addressed to a prominent fellow
Corvine, is accompanied by the original of the recipient’s transcription in blue ink of the
1894 letter from Rolfe to ‘R’ (Morley Roberts) which is quoted by Benkovitz on page 71
of her biography Frederick Rolfe: Baron Corvo. On his original 1894 letter, Roberts had
made marginal annotations in pencil, writing ‘Letter from the Prelate’ at the top of the first
page before sending the letter on to Henry Champion in Australia. Weeks provides an
exegesis of the Rolfe letter. Accompanying this material is a holograph letter dated 25 May
2006 from the recipient of Weeks’s exegesis to another correspondent, describing himself
as having been ‘a compulsive transcriber’ in the 1970s.
108
£40
96.
WEEKS, Donald
Typed Letter signed by Donald Weeks
2000
This four-page letter is written in Weeks’s characteristic style, expressing irritation at
minor mistakes made by another writer, Kevin Nudd, who has had the temerity to write
a magazine article about Rolfe. Weeks’s letter, dated 20 August 2000 and addressed to a
prominent fellow Corvine, is accompanied by xeroxed pages of the article by Kevin Nudd
in the Book and Magazine Collector. Weeks has underlined several phrases and numbered
them, and his letter consists of correspondingly numbered refutations of Nudd’s assertions.
£30
109
97.
WEEKS, Donald
A complete set of his ‘Tragara Monographs’
1974 - 1988
The Reverse Side of the Coin
1974. Subtitled ‘Some further correspondence between Frederick William Rolfe and Grant
Richards.’ Number 50 in an edition of 95 copies.
Aberdeen Interval
1975. Subtitled ‘Some letters from Frederick William Rolfe to Wilfrid Meynell.’ Number
60 in an edition of 120 copies.
Different Aspects
1976. Subtitled ‘Frederick William Rolfe & The Foreign Office.’ Number 114 in an
edition of 125 copies. Six small spots of foxing at fore-edge.
110
Frederick Rolfe and The Times
1977. Subtitled ‘4 - 12 February 1901.’ Number 9 in an edition of 175 copies.
Two Friends
1978. Subtitled ‘Frederick Rolfe and Henry Harland.’ Number 54 in an edition of 125
copies.
Saint Thomas
1979. ‘By Robert Hugh Benson and Frederick William Rolfe.’ Number 41 in an edition of
120 copies. Two small spots of foxing at paper extremities.
Frederick William Rolfe, Christchurch, and The Artist
1980. No subtitle. Number 92 in an edition of 120 copies. Spine sunned.
Frederick William Rolfe & Artists’ Models
1981. No subtitle. Number 113 in an edition of 115 copies.
Frederick William Rolfe, the 1903 Conclave & Hartwell de la Garde Grissell
1982. No subtitle. Number 43 in an edition of 110 copies.
Rolfe without Frederick
1983. No subtitle. Number 58 in an edition of 110 copies.
Frederick William Rolfe & Editors
1984. No subtitle. Number 103 in an edition of 110 copies.
111
Reviews of Unwritten Books: I
1985. No subtitle. Number 15 in an edition of 120 copies.
Reviews of Unwritten Books: II
1986. No subtitle. Number 96 in an edition of 110 copies.
Reviews of Unwritten Books: III
1987. No subtitle. Number 4 in an edition of 110 copies.
Reviews of Unwritten Books: IIII
1988. No subtitle. Number 108 in an edition of 110 copies.
The proprietor of the Tragara Press, the master printer Alan Anderson, has recalled that
Donald Weeks only visited Edinburgh once: ‘Arrangements for the Tragara items were all
made by letter. Weeks never enquired about the financial arrangements. He would post a
typed draft. The understanding was that, in return for the material, Weeks would get 20 to
25 copies, with a special colophon. I could sell the others in any way I chose. The Corvo
items always sold well. The print runs were always different, and this was always Weeks’s
decision; it had nothing to do with paper stock, which was never short.’
112
£450
98.
WOOLF, Cecil
‘Frederick Rolfe: A Bibliographical Essay’
1955
A fine copy of the May 1955 number of The Amateur Book Collector containing this article
by Cecil Woolf, describing the first fruits of his Baron Corvo bibliographical researches.
This copy is inscribed on the front cover: ‘With best wishes from Cecil Woolf, Sept 1st
1955.’
together with
Offprints of three letters to newspapers
1960
When he was gathering material for his projected biography of Rolfe, Woolf made a
practice of writing letters for publication in newspapers in provincial locations where Rolfe
had lived. These are offprints of three such letters.
Sometimes ‒ although not in these three letters ‒ Woolf would use the stratagem of
deliberately getting his facts slightly wrong. His pseudonymous letter would begin: ‘Local
residents will be interested to learn that a writer named Freddie Rolke, who I understand
wrote a novel called Hadrian the Fourth, lived in the town for some months,’ promptly to
be followed by another letter in his own name correcting these details and asking whether
longterm residents could add anything further. This sometimes elicited surprising and
useful information.
£20
113
99.
WOOLF, Cecil
A Bibliography of Frederick Rolfe Baron Corvo
1957
Rupert Hart-Davis. FIRST EDITION. A pristine copy, in a fine dustjacket with an
embrowned backstrip, inscribed in the month before publication: ‘For Alan Anderson /
with very many thanks / and best wishes / from / Cecil Woolf / Dec 20th 56.’ With Alan
Anderson’s blue ex libris on the front pastedown endpaper.
An exceptional and meticulous contribution to Corvine scholarship, and as important in its
own way as The Quest for Corvo. This achievement is all the more astonishing when it is
recalled that, when this book was published, Cecil Woolf was still only twenty-nine years of
age.
114
£60
100.
ZAINA, Alexandra
Two articles in The Aylesford Review
1960
‘The Italian Version of “Hadrian VII” ’
Fine copy of the Summer 1960 number, containing this article by Alexandra Zaina and a
three-quarter-page advertisement for Corvo, 1860 ‒ 1960. The title of Rolfe’s novel was
not, of course, Hadrian VII but Hadrian the Seventh.
together with
‘The Corvo Revival’
Fine copy of the Autumn 1960 number, containing this article by Alexandra Zaina.
together with
‘Aylesford Review / Carmelite Supplement / Summer 1960’
A four-page pamphlet ‒ not written by Zaina ‒ printed on flimsy orange-brown paper,
thanking the periodical’s financial supporters by name.
together with
A printed advertisement and order form, stating as one of the journal’s virtues that ‘The
Aylesford Review has devoted more attention to the recent centenary of Frederick Rolfe,
Baron Corvo than has any other periodical.’
£30
115
ROLFE AND HIS FUMIFICABLES
In everything that he did, Frederick Rolfe was acutely conscious of the impression
he was making. He had the natural actor’s fondness for cultivating eccentricity, and he
knew that it was likely to be the most incidental of his peculiarities that would make him
memorable to new acquaintances.
When he drafted his colourful fictions, it was in outsized folders, using the largest
Waterman fountain pen obtainable. When commissioned to paint his Holywell processional
banners, he laboured to develop and master an entirely new stained arras technique. And
when he wanted to write a letter, he would compose it using his natural cursive hand, before
copying it out as a final product in a beautiful Petrarchan script.
It is not in the least surprising, therefore, that when Rolfe took to tobacco, he looked
for startlingly original ways of indulging his habit.
Smoking was a part of his life from his teenage years. By his early twenties he had
begun to take a collector’s interest in meerschaum pipes, and his pupil Lawrence Grant
recalled that in 1883, when Rolfe was still only twenty-three, he had the finest collection
of such pipes Grant had ever seen. Three years later, Rolfe was stimulated to expand this
collection when he lodged with a lifelong meerschaum collector, the father of his private
pupils Edward and Reginald Slaughter. Rolfe’s pipes were with him at the Oscott seminary,
but that is the last we hear of them.
‘A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure,’ wrote Oscar Wilde in The Picture
of Dorian Gray. ‘It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied.’ Rolfe would certainly have
endorsed this sentiment, and we have it on record that in his schoolmastering years he made
it his business to teach his pupils the finer points of rolling and smoking cigarettes, as one of
the distinguishing features of a true gentleman.
116
Grant wrote years later that Rolfe ‘smoked the most delicate tobacco and always
had a “bean” in his pouch, and the delicacy of flavour this gives to a smoke none can know
without having used it.’ Grant was fourteen at this time. A decade later, given responsibility
for the moral welfare of the eleven-year-old Malcolm and ten-year-old Cuthbert Hay, Rolfe
instructed them, among other practical skills, in the lighting and smoking of cigars.
T
Throughout Rolfe’s life, men of his class and background rolled their own cigarettes.
The cigarette-making machine was invented in 1881, by the American James Bonsack, but
for some years these ready made cigarettes were sold in wooden boxes, too bulky to carry
around. This gave rise to the popularity of pocket-sized metal cigarette cases, although
large numbers of smokers, Rolfe included, continued to use soft leather tobacco pouches and
packs of cigarette papers.
It goes without saying that Rolfe always used the largest tobacco pouch and papers he
could find. His fellow Oscott seminarian James Dey recalled that he had never seen a larger
pouch, and we know from Nicholas Crabbe that Rolfe used ‘huge ungummed papers.’ His
alter ego Pope Hadrian uses the Rolfean method of rolling cigarettes: ‘He made a cigarette
very carefully, a long fat one with the tobacco tucked into the paper cylinder with a pencil,
and with neatly twisted ends, resembling a small white sausage.’
As his addiction progressed, Rolfe graduated to ever stronger tobacco blends. In his
twenties he used mild, delicate tobacco. By his thirties, he was sending John Holden to the
tobacconist to buy tins of ‘Capstan Navy Cut, Strong.’ In his early forties he was deprecating
Henry Harland’s preference for Three Castles cigarettes, probably because they were a mild
Virginia blend and came in newfangled cardboard packs.
Over the final decade or more of his life, Rolfe mixed his own blend. ‘I used to bring
him twelve packages of different tobacco,’ Temple Scott later wrote, ‘named by him, which
he would blend for his cigarettes. He liked, he said, to have twelve emotions in smoking.’
Harry Bainbridge’s recollection was that there were four tobaccos in Rolfe’s blend:
‘Corvo had his special cigarette tobacco made up of four brands, which had to be most
carefully blended; from time to time he set apart an evening for this purpose...I should have
kept the recipe of that mixture. It was not one which could be inhaled, Corvo never did that,
but he smoked cigarettes incessantly, fat ones, and they had a bouquet like no others I have
ever come across. Although I do not possess the exact details I might make a good approach
to the recipe and call it the “Corvo Blend” ‒ the name alone would sell it. He called it the
“Crab Mixture”.’
Trevor Hadden reported that this Rolfe blend had ‘a heavy full flavour, evidently
due to Latakia,’ which would account for its peppery smell. Gone were the days of mild and
delicate tobacco. When he was out of funds, he could not refrain from smoking, satisfying
himself with an unappetising mixture of blackberry leaves and tea-leaves.
117
T
Rolfe famously features as the principal protagonist of most of his own fiction. In his
Toto stories he notes approvingly at one point that Toto has distributed cigarettes ‒ from a
wooden box, of course ‒ to the other boys. One of the stories contains the only disapproving
reference to smoking in all Rolfe’s books, when he rejects Toto’s offer of tobacco, ‘for the
aromatick air had done nothing to deserve defilement.’ At several points in the stories the
Baron smokes ‘a new huqa, a lovely thing sent from Smyrna.’ Toto is content to squat next
to this hookah, keeping its bowl alight with embers from a scaldino.
Rolfe took an interest in the history of tobacco, and was aware that his namesake John
Rolfe had been the first settler in Virginia to grow tobacco successfully as a cash crop. A more
personal reason for his interest in the history of tobacco, however, was his friendship with the
Duchess Sforza Cesarini’s daughter-in-law Vincenza, a member of the Santacroce family. It
was one of Vincenza’s forebears, Cardinal Prospero Santacroce, who had introduced tobacco
cultivation to Italy, where for a time it was referred to as erba santacroce. Rolfe’s novel Don
Tarquinio is the story of one eventful day in the history of the Santacroce family, related by
Tarquinio to his son the future Cardinal Prospero.
Cigarettes play a melodramatic part in the plot of Nicholas Crabbe. Robert Kemp,
who Crabbe hopes will become his ‘divine friend,’ is a fellow smoker, but is too delicate to
hold his cigarettes in his fingers, preferring the use of a ring-clip. At one point he fumbles
in trying to roll and attach a cigarette, and the tobacco flutters to the ground. He tearfully
admits to Crabbe that he is going blind, and it is only the latter’s stiff upper lip Englishness
which stops him from giving Kemp a consoling hug: ‘For the first and only time in his life,
Crabbe wished that he had been born an Italian instead of an Englishman.’
The eponymous pope in Rolfe’s best-known novel Hadrian the Seventh is an
inveterate smoker. He has beside him in the throne room ‘a small table with cigarettes,
cigarette-papers and tobacco, the Crab Mixture which George Arthur Rose had invented.’ He
chain-smokes when he is alone, when he is dining and when he is meeting with his cardinals.
After one such meeting, Cardinal Gentilotti comments that ‘while we were talking, Your
Holiness made and smoked nineteen cigarettes.’
T
Frederick Rolfe lived at a time when smoking was thought to be good for one’s
health. It was reputed to calm the nerves and induce a general feeling of well-being. ‘I
always think tobacco the first thing in the morning,’ he proclaimed through the medium of
Nicholas Crabbe. In 1913, at the age of fifty-three, he died in Venice of sudden cardiac arrest,
and it is tempting to speculate that his lifelong heavy smoking contributed to his relatively
early death.
118
Twenty years before, Rolfe had complained to John Holden, who was helping him
paint the Holywell banners, that his recent sexual escapades in nearby towns had been
unsatisfactory. ‘Do you think I am impotent?’ he had asked, and Holden had replied ‘No,
I shouldn’t say that. You can’t, that’s all. What do you think is the cause?’ ‘Too much
smoking,’ said Rolfe. Holden thereupon declared that Rolfe would have to give one of them
up: sex or smoking. Reporting this conversation years later, Holden said that Rolfe had made
his choice without hesitation: ‘He very deliberately plugged and lit his pipe, and began to
puff at it furiously.’
Robert Scoble
November 2013
119