MAUGHAM, W. Somerset.

The Plays of W. Somerset Maugham.

London: William Heinemann, 1912-1930.

$1,800.00

In Stock Item Number: RRB-152403

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Twelve First Editions of the Plays of W. Somerset Maugham in the Original Wrappers; The Tenth Man Inscribed by Maugham to Elsie Tritton

Rare collection of twelve first editions of the plays of W. Somerset Maugham, one of the most celebrated and commercially successful dramatists of the Edwardian and interwar English stage, including a presentation copy inscribed by the author to Elsie Tritton. Octavo, twelve volumes in the original publisher’s champagne printed wrappers, comprising: Mrs. Dot (1912), Penelope (1912), The Explorer (1912), Landed Gentry (1913), The Tenth Man (1913), The Circle (1921), Caesar's Wife (1922), Our Betters (1923), Home and Beauty (1923), The Unattainable (1923), Loaves and Fishes (1924), and The Bread-Winner (1930). The Tenth Man (1913) is an association copy, inscribed by W. Somerset Maugham to Elsie Tritton on the half-title page, “[The Tenth Man] by W. Somerset Maugham for Elsie Tritton.” The recipient, Elsie Tritton, was a noted book collector and friend of Maugham’s, and, significantly, the person who introduced him to Alan Searle. Searle became Maugham’s devoted companion and secretary for the last decades of his life, from the mid-1940s, after Gerald Haxton’s death, until Maugham died in 1965. In fine condition. An exceptional group of the playwright’s work in the fragile original wrappers, seldom found so well preserved.

W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) was among the most widely read authors of the twentieth century, celebrated for novels including Of Human Bondage, The Moon and Sixpence, and The Razor’s Edge, as well as for a large and admired body of short stories. Before the First World War he was equally renowned as one of London’s most successful playwrights: in 1908 he achieved the rare distinction of having four plays running simultaneously in the West End, a triumph famously immortalized by a Punch cartoon depicting Shakespeare biting his nails in envy before the theater hoardings. Issued in slender volumes by William Heinemann in their distinctive champagne printed wrappers, and catalogued in Raymond Toole Stott’s standard bibliography of the author, Maugham’s plays are increasingly difficult to find in the original wrappers in fine state. This collection descends from the library of the noted collector Craig V. Showalter.