A.A. Milne

Complete set of first editions of the Pooh Books, all in original dust jackets, with When We Were Very Young signed by Milne and Shepard.

• Sold as a set of 4.
• When We Were Very Young; Winnie The Pooh; Now We Are Six; The House At Pooh Corner.
• A.A. Milne (English).
• Illustrated by E.H. Shepard (English).
• London: Methuen, 1924; 1926; 1927; 1928.
• Signed by Milne and Shepard on title page of When We Were Very Young.
• Bound in original blue, green, red and pink cloths, and in original color printed dust jackets, top edges gilt.
• Housed in blue goatskin box with in-laid Pooh design on front board.

"It was a drowsy summer afternoon, and the Forest was full of gentle sounds, which all seemed to be saying to Pooh, 'Don't listen to Rabbit, listen to me.' So he got in a comfortable position for not listening to Rabbit."

In 1933, Compton Mackenzie described the publication of the first Pooh Book, When We Were Very Young, as marking "an epoch as positively as any children's book has ever marked one. It is not extravagant to surmise that a distant posterity may find in that volume of children's verse a key with which to unlock the present more easily than with any contemporary novel, poem, or play" (quoted in Thwaite). The series is an evocative reflection of English childhood in the 1920s, yet transcends the time and place of its making for each new generation to discover—and fall for. As the first book in the series, When We Were Very Young is the most difficult to find signed, making this an especially desirable set.

Thwaite, Goodbye Christopher Robin: A.A. Milne and the Making of Winnie-The-Pooh.