II
Portions of what I offer as a consensus view of the early history of the book may seem almost
tediously familiar.[2] In spring of 1798 Wordsworth,
Coleridge, and their friend the Bristol
bookseller Joseph Cottle settled on a plan that Cottle publish a joint collection of Wordsworth's
and Coleridge's poems,
Lyrical Ballads. Authorship was to remain anonymous.
[3] Printing went
forward in Bristol during the summer. The poems printed began with Coleridge's "The Rime of
the Ancyent Marinere" and concluded with Wordsworth's "Lines Written a Few Miles above
Tintern Abbey," and among them was a poem of Coleridge's (based on a juvenile poem by
Wordsworth) "Lewti," which had already been published pseudonymously. What resulted
bibliographically from the printing was a volume with collation π1 2π1 [A]
8 B-N
8 O
4(-O4): π1
containing the title: 2π1, the table of contents; [A]1 through O1, the text; O2, a list of errata; and
O3, an advertisement of books published jointly by Biggs and Cottle, T. N. Longman, and Lee
and Hurst. Apparently just as printing concluded, however, someone—most likely
Coleridge—recognized that the true authorship of "Lewti" was public knowledge and that the
anonymity of the book was compromised; so "Lewti" was cancelled and replaced by another
poem of Coleridge's, "The Nightingale." At much that same moment Wordsworth brought
forward a short prefatory essay for the book. The products of these two events, for printing and
binding, were four new leaves for "The Nightingale," replacing the three leaves occupied by
"Lewti;" three new leaves for Wordsworth's prefatory essay, inserted between title leaf and
contents leaf; and a new contents leaf, now following the prefatory essay rather than the title and
listing "The Nightingale" instead of "Lewti." Accordingly, "The Nightingale" was printed on a
half sheet for gathering as a four, and the prefatory essay and new contents page were likewise
printed on a half sheet for gathering as a four; and the
collation of the revised volume became π1 2π
4 [A]
8 B-D
8 (-D8) χ
4
E
8 (-E1, 2) F-N
8O
4(-O4): π1 containing the title; 2π1, 2, 3 containing
the prefatory essay; 2π4 containing the new table of contents; D, χ, and E now incorporating
"The Nightingale"; and the rest remaining unaltered. The title pages of the earliest-bound copies
known, however, indicate that by the time they were printed Cottle had resigned the office of
publisher; for their imprint is, in full, "BRISTOL: | PRINTED BY BIGGS AND COTTLE, |
FOR T. N. LONGMAN, PATERNOSTER-ROW, LONDON. | 1798." Cottle's retreat had
probably been caused by an intimidating combination of financial ill-health and doubts—possibly induced by Robert Southey—regarding sales; but Longman, although Cottle had undoubtedly
approached him, had not yet formally undertaken the publication.
The scene of events widened beyond Bristol in late August when, certainly not before
holding the completed Lyrical Ballads in their hands, Wordsworth, Dorothy Wordsworth, and
Coleridge set off for Germany. By 28 August William and Dorothy, at least, had reached London,
where William planned diplomacy of some sort with Longman. On 5 September Southey wrote
about the book to William Taylor of Norwich in phrasing that suggests he thought it well
distributed; and by the second week of September copies had been received by London literati
and by acquaintances of Cottle and the authors. By mid-September Wordsworth had recognized
that Longman would not participate in the enterprise, and, without consulting Cottle, had found a
willing publisher in Joseph Johnson (who had published Wordsworth's only earlier books
An Evening Walk and Descriptive Sketches). Cottle by then not only knew about Longman but had
probably already sold the edition to the Arch brothers and set about printing a new title page and
binding copies for them. On 15 September the uninformed Wordsworth wrote to Cottle from
Yarmouth asking him to transfer the edition to Johnson. Next day, none the wiser, he, Dorothy,
and Coleridge sailed for Germany. The Arches announced Lyrical Ballads to the public on 4
October. Cottle was to have paid Wordsworth thirty guineas upon completion of printing, but
because of his embarrassed circumstances did not complete payment until July 1799.
Copies representing the ideal first Bristol-Longman collation of the book as just described—π1 2π1 [A]8 B-N8 O4(-O4)—are found at Yale University (Beineke Library) and Princeton University. Copies representing the ideal second Bristol-Longman collation as just described—π1 2π4 [A]8 B-D8 (-D8) χ4 E8 (-E1, 2) F-N8 O4 (-O4)—are found at Cornell University; Harvard University (Widener Collection); New York Public Library (Berg Collection); Wellington University (Alexander Turnbull Library). On the recto of the front free end paper of the Harvard copy appears an owner's inscription by a friend of Wordsworth's, John Frederick Pinney, dated at Pinney's home, "Great George Street Bristol, 1798," and on the front pastedown appears a note, apparently in the same hand, "Coleridge's Rime of the Ancyent Marinere"; but how Pinney obtained the book remains uncertain.
Copies representing the ideal first Bristol-Longman collation of the book as just
described—π1 2π1 [A]8 B-N8 O4(-O4)—are found at Yale
University (Beineke Library) and Princeton University. Copies representing the ideal second
Bristol-Longman collation as just described—π1 2π4 [A]8 B-D8 (-D8)
π4 E8 (-E1, 2) F-N8 O4 (-O4)—are found at Cornell University; Harvard
University (Widener Collection); New York Public Library (Berg Collection); Wellington
University (Alexander Turnbull Library). On the recto of the front free end paper of the Harvard
copy appears an owner's inscription by a friend of Wordsworth's, John Frederick Pinney, dated at
Pinney's home, "Great George Street | Bristol, 1798," and on the front pastedown
appears a note, apparently in the same hand, "Coleridge's Rime of the Ancyent Marinere"; but
how Pinney obtained the book remains uncertain.
Copies representing the ideal second Bristol-Longman collation except in lacking leaf
O3 are at Indiana University (Lilly Library) and Trinity College,
Cambridge (
The Rothschild Library, Cambridge, 1954, item no. 2603 and plate XLVI), and in a private collection, copy
presently on deposit at the Pierpont Morgan Library (
Rothschild Library, item no. 2602); and
another was in a private collection when examined in 1994. The Trinity College copy contains
early revision of "The Ancyent Marinere" in the autograph of Coleridge, and one of the leaves
containing revision has been rudely folded and torn out—as if used for a
memorandum—and later replaced: it is hard to imagine that the rudeness came from
anyone but Coleridge, in a copy that he at the time regarded as practically expendable—so,
likely to have been in his hands soon after printing. Other Bristol-Longman copies survive
incomplete and/or with redundant leaves—one each at the New York Public Library (Berg
Collection) and Yale (Beineke Library), and two at the British Library. These four appear to be
variously the results of making-do, of bibliophilic preservation, and of jest. This New York
Public Library copy evidently once belonged to Coleridge's and Southey's sister-in-law Martha
Fricker and was probably presented to her by Coleridge.
[4] It is bound in calico-cloth-covered
boards in a fashion characteristic of bindings done by members of the Southey family
for—although perhaps not exclusively for—what Southey called his "Cottonian
Library." It lacks a title leaf but retains the "Lewti" contents leaf, and the body of the book is of
the first ideal collation, [A]
8 B-N
8 O
4(-O4).
[5] Certainly one of the British Library copies, and
probably the Yale copy, were bound deliberately to preserve together both the earlier "Lewti" and
later "Nightingale." This British Library copy (C 58 c 12 [1]), which once belonged to Southey,
includes the Bristol-Longman title leaf, the "Lewti" contents leaf, also 2π
4 (including
the "Nightingale" contents leaf), and also a complete D
8 including "Lewti," but lacks O3.
[6] The
Yale copy (In W890 798c) is the same except that it lacks also the "Lewti" contents leaf. The
other British Library copy is like ideal-collation "Nightingale" copies except that following page
62 (that is, between D7 and χ1) is inserted a leaf containing Thomas Beddoes'
"Domiciliary Verses," which were intended as a parody of the poetic style of the surrounding
volume. The leaf was printed and inserted at Beddoes' direction.
[7] I have examined all of these books. The
sheets of at least two of them—that containing Beddoes' verses and that at
Cornell—were first gathered by the binder with a "Lewti" contents leaf following the
Bristol-Longman title, then altered by substitution of four-leaf 2π for the
"Lewti" contents leaf, plainly in a process of conversion of first-collation copies to
second-collation: a clear sign that the Longman title was in use, and so almost certainly printed,
before 2π
4—and, for reasons to be indicated more distinctly
below—before χ as well.
[8] The volume as finally published by J. and A. Arch is,
apart from the title leaf, identical with the second-ideal-collation Bristol-Longman
Lyrical Ballads as already described.
