Austen, Jane | The first American edition of Pride and Prejudice

Austen, Jane

Elizabeth Bennet; or, Pride and Prejudice. Philadelphia: Carey & Lea, 1832

2 vols., 12mo in 6s (195 × 114 mm, uncut as issued). Vol. 1 with the scarce integral advertisement leaf, vol. 1 lacking pp. 45–48, which are supplied in sympathetic facsimile, usual foxing and browning, some scattered stains. Publisher’s quarter brown cloth, drab boards, plain wove pastedowns and one free endpaper, 14-pages of publisher’s adverts bound at end of vol. 1; rebacked to style. Cloth folding-case.

First American (from the third London) edition, one of only 750 sets printed. The author is not named, but is identified on the title-page as "the Author of 'Sense and Sensibility,' &c." 

Rare: only a handful of copies have appeared at auction during the last century.

REFERENCE:

Keynes 10; Gilson (1969) passim; Gilson (1982) B2

PROVENANCE:

Mrs. M. L. Lyon (signature, nineteenth-century, on page [5] in each volume, replacing an earlier signature clipped away, perhaps her maiden name) — Robert Hartshorne (1866–1927, of Highlands, New Jersey, Grolier Club 1903–27) — by descent, sold 2021