Lot 684
Yeats, W.B.
Rare Books, Maps & Manuscripts
Auction: Rare Books, Maps & Manuscripts
Description
The secret rose; with illustrations by J.B. Yeats. London: Lawrence & Bullen Limited, 1897. First edition, 8vo., frontispiece and other plates, original blue cloth with elaborate gilt design by Althea Gyles, uncut, rubbed at head tail and extremities, spine slightly darkened, offsetting to endpapers, ownership inscription on the front free endpaper
Footnote
Note: Wade 21. Eighteen occult stories which created an exotic atmosphere which was intensified by Yeats's experimentation with hashish and mescal. The famous cover was designed to make the book resemble a grimoire, signifying the "conjunction of the Rose and the Cross, and of man and woman, in the midst of the serpentine folds of the Tree of Life." (Richard Ellmann: The Identity of Yeats, London, 1968 pp. 64-65). First state of the binding with Lawrence & Bullen at the foot of the spine