The Pied Piper of Hamelin: A Child's Story
Rand McNally Co. Publishers, 1937. Hope Dunlap. Later printing. Hardcover. 56pp. Quarto [26 cm] Light blue cloth covered boards with an illustrated paper label on the front board. Illustrated endsheets. Good. The covers are rubbed and scratched, and have numerous small stains. The underlying boards are exposed occasionally along the edges. There are several very small losses from the cloth at the ends of the very subtly faded spine, and the cloth is slightly frayed. There is a 1/2 inch split in the cloth of the rear board along the joint. Previous owner's name on the front free endsheet. There is a short closed tear in the top margin of p. 15. The pages have very occasional light stains. Item #30719
Most of Browning's education came from his well-read father. It is widely thought that he could already read and write by the age of five. A bright and anxious student, Browning learned Latin, Greek, and French at the age of fourteen. From fourteen to sixteen he was educated at home, attended to by numerous tutors in music, drawing, dancing, and horsemanship. At the age of twelve he wrote a volume of Byronic verse entitled Incondita, which his parents tried, unsuccessfully, to have published. In 1833, Browning anonymously published his first major published work, Pauline, and in 1840 he published Sordello, which was commonly viewed as a failure. He also tried writing dramas, but his plays, including Strafford, which ran for five nights in 1837, and the Bells and Pomegranates series, were mostly unsuccessful. Nevertheless, the techniques he developed through his dramatic monologues, particularly his use of diction, rhythm, and symbol, are regarded as his most important contribution to poetry, influencing such highly acclaimed poets of the twentieth century as Ezra Pound, T. S. Eliot, and Robert Frost.
Price: $50.00