Alexander, William, Earl of Stirling Recreations with the Muses London 1637
Alexander, William, Earl of Stirling. Recreations with the Muses. London: printed by Tho. Harper, 1637. (10)62(2), 63-253(1); (4)326 pp. Folio, contemporary calf, rebacked, most of original spine preserved (slight rubbing). First edition. The collected writings in verse of a leading Scottish statesman, courtier, scholar, and poet. Appearing here for the first time is a considerable fragment of a sacred epic called "Jonathan;" all the rest had previously been published, but the text has been extensively revised for this handsome folio, which was printed three years before the author's death. The poems of the Earl of Stirling were praised by such contemporaries as Drayton, and were read with care by Milton. "Broadly, his poem are weighty with thought after the type of Fulke Greville, Lord Brooke, though scarcely so obscure as his. His tragedies have 'brave translunary things,' if laboured and dull as a whole. His 'Aurora' and minor pieces are elegant and musical." -- DNB. A very few copies of this book are known with a frontispiece portrait by Marshall, but this plate was evidently issued as a separate print, and was not present in the book as first offered for sale; the dedication copy does not have it, and the example in the Pforzheimer copy appears to have been suplied. Outer margin of the title-page trimmed a bit close, just touching the woodcut border, but generally a very good crisp copy, with the 19th-century bookplate of Thomas Preston, Bart., and the recent bookplate of Robert S. Pirie. STC 347; Pforzheimer 5; CBEL I, 1081.
£1250
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