Unique Rare Complete Spy Vanity Fair Volume Circa 1869 included 153 Colored Portrait Plates

Name Of Print A Complete Vanity Fair Volume With All 153 Chromolithograph Portrait Plates.
Author/Artist A weekly published Vanity Fair work which was published in London by Ranken and Co. between 1869 to 1971.
Date of Publication Dated Jan 30, 1869 to December 30,1871. (Plate # 13 through 165).
Type of Print Original colored lithograph.
Size of Image
Folio: app. 15 1/2" X 10 3/4".

Each plates goes 400-500 dollars due to its rarity.

Condition In pristine condition. Bound into the original library binding. With a leather raised band spine and tips over a hardback cloth binding. The spines are a bit faded but internally all plates and descriptive text pages are present and in remarkably good condition.

Description
We are proud to be able to offer a fine original complete volume of Vanity Fair magazine complete with all 153 chromolithographic plates.

This volume has portrait plates of Charles Darwin, Alfred Tessyson, John Everett Millais and 4 judge plates, among many others. We are hoping that this volume will remain in its intact state and that the next owner will resist the temptation to break the volume for the obvious short term financial gain. You will be richly rewarded for so doing.

Vanity Fair was a weekly magazine of social, literary, and political content. Victorian and Edwardian England celebrated this work and most noted were its caricatures of famous men and women of the time.

Thomas Gibson Bowles was the founder, owner, and editor of the magazine until 1889. He described the images as "grim faces made more grim, grotesque figures made more grotesque, and dull people made duller by the genius of our talented collaborator 'Ape'; but there is nothing that has been treated with a set purpose to make it something that it was not already originally in a lesser degree." Bowles also wrote the biographical commentaries on each caricature under the pseudonym 'Jehu Junior'. Other contributors to the magazine include Lewis Carroll, Willie Wilde, P. G. Wodehouse, Jessie Pope and Bertram Fletcher Robinson.

Vanity Fair also featured word games, book and theater reviews, financial advice columns, serialized fiction, travel reports, and more. Eventually the magazine moved away from political and economic news and moved on to more social ventures. It remained informative as well as amusing throughout its publication. The caricatures are quintessentially English and have gained popularity among collectors and interior designers over the years.

The most memorable parts of the magazine were the biographies and accompanying caricatures. These were conceived by Bowles, who added them to the magazine in the first year of its existence. Ultimately there were 2300 caricatures, always somewhat to quite ridiculous, but perceptive and revealing.

These original lithographic prints give a rare satirical glimpse into life in 19th c. England.


If you are one of our International friends, please contact us with your particulars (name of country, insurance requirements if any) so that we might get as accurate a quote as possible to get your purchase to you in a timely fashion.

Please note that we now have (finally, mercifully) a legitimate "about me" section where you can find more information about who we are and what we do as well as more tips on collecting prints and the various types of printing techniques that have been used over the years. In addition, we have hundreds of rare prints and colorplate books, maps and atlases at set prices. We have recently been fortunate enough to acquire, for example, the original watercolors from Lewin's "Birds of Great Britain". We also have listed several prints from Shaw and Nodder's "The Naturalist's Miscellany", flower prints from Curtis' "Flora Londinensis", P.J. Redoute's "Les Liliacees". Please also check out our ebay listings for some phenomenal Abbeville edition elephant folio restrikes of Audubon's "Birds Of America" which are what many refer to as the preeminent 20th century facsimile edition of this important work. We will be updating this frequently. We are committed to offering the very best antique prints available with over the top superior service.

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