You are bidding on a scarce antique hardcover book title The Lucubrations of Isaac Bickerstaff, Esq. This publication was also known as The Tatler. Printed in London in 1743 for H. Lintot, et al. This is Volume III from a larger set.
The Tatler was a British literary and society journal begun by Richard Steele in 1709 and published for two years. It represented a new approach to journalism, featuring cultivated essays on contemporary manners, and established the pattern that would be copied in such British classics Addison and Steele's Spectator, Samuel Johnson's Rambler and Idler, Goldsmith's Citizen of the World, and influence essayists as late as Charles Lamb and William Hazlitt. Addison and Steele liquidated the The Tatler in order to make a fresh start with the similar Spectator, and the collected issues of Tatler are usually published in the same volume as the collected Spectator.
Tatler was founded in 1709 by Richard Steele, who used the nom de plume "Isaac Bickerstaff, Esquire". This is the first known such consistently adopted journalistic persona, which adapted to the first person, as it were, the 17th-century genre of "characters", as first established in English by Sir Thomas Overbury and then expanded by Lord Shaftesbury's Characteristics (1711). Steele's conceit (embodied in the title 'Tatler')was to publish the news and gossip heard in various London coffeehouses (in reality he mixed real gossip with invented stories of his own), and, so he declared in the opening paragraph, to leave the subject of politics to the newspapers, while presenting Whiggish views and correcting middle-class manners, while instructing "these Gentlemen, for the most part being Persons of strong Zeal, and weak Intellects...what to think." To assure complete coverage of local gossip, he pretended to place a reporter in each of the city's four most popular coffeehouses, and the text of each issue was subdivided according to the names of these four: accounts of manners and mores were datelined from White's; literary notes from Will's; notes of antiquarian interest were dated from the Grecian Coffee House; and news items from St. James's Coffee House.
The journal was originally published three times a week, and Steele eventually brought in contributions from his literary friends Jonathan Swift and Joseph Addison, though both of them pretended to be writing as Isaac Bickerstaff and authorship was revealed only when the papers were collected in a bound volume. The original Tatler was published for only two years, from 12 April 1709 to 2 January 1711. A collected edition was published in 1710–11, with the title The Lucubrations of Isaac Bickerstaff, Esq. In 1711, Steele and Addison decided to liquidate The Tatler, and co-founded The Spectator magazine, which used a different persona than Bickerstaff.
Book is fully bound in lovely mottled leather binding. The spine has four raised bands. The title "Tatler" is in gold on red morocco label but it is partially gone. The label with the volume number is gone. There are also intricate gold designs in the compartments. Covers are attached with slight separation along gutters. All pages are clean and tightly bound. Has decorative endpages. Book shows some general wear but remains in near-very good condition, especially considering its age.
The book also has very interesting provenance. There is a signature on first blank page as follows: "William Tattersall. The gift of Mrs Jes Hamond, June 5, 1844. (Not sure of the spelling of the Mrs. name). There is also a bookplate on inside of front cover with the name Tattersall and their crest. The book appears to have been the property of Reverend William Tattersall of Charlton Place, Canterbury.
A very rare antique book with provenance dating back to a very old lineage!
Would make a super addition to a collection.
Great gift idea!
(Inventory: 193C)