12mo. In two volumes. ix, [3], 291, [1]; [6], 259pp, [1]. Contemporary dark green half-calf, marbled paper boards, tooled in gilt and blind, marbled edges. Rubbed, wear to head of spines. Marbled endpapers, faded ink-stamps of a contemporary literary society to both titles, paper repair to fore-edge of Vol. II title page, scattered spotting. William St Clair's copy, with his distinctive pencilled ownership inscription and bibliographical notes to front blank fly-leaves of Vol. I.

The first collected edition of essayist, critic and poet of the Romantic movement, Charles Lamb (1775-1834) including his trenchant defence of the genius behind Shakespeare's characters, 'On the Tragedies of Shakespeare'.

William St Clair (1937-2021), British scholar and senior civil servant, notable as the author of The Godwins and the Shelleys, The Biography of a Family (1989) and The Reading Nation in the Romantic Period (2004).