 | |  |
I
On 13 April 1942, Mr. Brett of William Heinemann, Ltd. wrote to Ames W. Williams in response to his request for the publishing history of the books by Stephen Crane published by that firm.[4] Brett reported that Heinemann's "file copies are missing as are some of our records," so that although he attached "herewith a list of details which I have made as complete as possible" he "had to rely on memory for some of the items, because the records have gone."
About The Red Badge of Courage, Brett notes: "First published November 26th 1895, in Heinemann's Pioneer Series, Green cloth, also in paper covers. Five more impressions done during Jan-Feb 1896. 6d edition, July 1900, 3/6 edition April 1925. The first edition was undoubtedly issued in 1895. If your copy dated 1896 has no indication on the back of the title page that it is a reprint, it is possible but I do not think probable, that the first edition was dated 1896."
Of course the first printing was dated 1896. And we have located copies of two of the five reprintings mentioned by Brett: both Bruccoli and Katz have clothbound copies which call themselves "Second Edition" and "Fourth Edition." In the first printing the sheets are .009+” thick. In the "second edition" — the probable second printing — the sheets are .008” thick; the copyright page reads "First Edition, November 1895"; and tipped in preceding the half-title is a list of notices for The Red Badge of Courage, separately paged [1]-2. In the "fourth edition" — the probable fourth printing — the sheets are .009” thick; the copyright page reads "First Edition, November 1895 / Second Edition, January 1896"; and the list of notices is present.[5] In 1900 Heinemann published a new 6d edition
For George's Mother — which was first published by Edward Arnold — Brett has no definite information: "Sorry, but I can find no records. It was a small book, done, I believe in a 7d cloth edition and was possibly one of the stories in 'BOWERY TALES'." Bruccoli and Katz have copies of a 1915 Heinemann publication in the "Sevenpenny Net Novels" series.
Brett states only that Maggie: A Child of the Streets was "Published September 11th 1896. A small volume bound in dark blue cloth with gold lettering back and side. No reprints." Williams and Starrett list reprints, including: "London: William Heinemann, [1915]." Bruccoli has a copy in the "Sevenpenny Net Novels" series, uniform with a reprint of George's Mother, dated 1915 on its title page.
The Little Regiment, Brett notes, was "Published February 6th 1897, in Heinemann's Pioneer Series, Green cloth, also in paper covers. No reprints." The Clifton Waller Barrett Collection, University of Virginia, has a copy in orange cloth which further differs from the standard format in lacking the pictorial front wrapper that was bound into the green cloth copies. This orange cloth binding is a Heinemann binding, not a custom rebinding. A reprint of The Little Regiment is described below, with Pictures of War.
Brett indicates that The Third Violet was "Published May 6th 1897. also a Colonial Edition; Red cloth and in paper covers A new binding of the ordinary edition June 1900 (designed by the artist William Nicholson) No reprints." We have not yet located copies of either the "Colonial Edition" or the 1900 binding.
On The Open Boat Brett states "Published April 18th 1898. Also a Colonial edition. Red cloth and in paper covers. A new binding of the ordinary edition June 1900 (William Nicholson) No reprints." The Barrett collection has a copy of the wrappered "Colonial edition"; we have not yet located a copy in red cloth. In the Barrett collection there also is a copy in green S cloth which BAL #4080 identifies as representing the colonial edition, but the copy is not so marked. According to BAL, "The publishers report that this edition was 'published 20th April 1898. 1,500 copies. All bound. . . . It was our custom to bind some of the Colonial editions in paper and some in cloth and unfortunately we have no record as to how many of the 1,500 copies were bound in cloth and how many in paper'."
BAL also notes a "Times Book Club Edition" in orange V cloth: "According to the publisher's records this issue was made up of the 575 unsold sheets of the first printing. The sheets were sold to the club March 20, 1906." Bruccoli has a copy in blue V cloth with the Times Book Club seal on the lower spine.
Pictures of War, Brett says, was "Published July 13th 1898. Also a Colonial edition in cloth and paper. Ordinary edition cover design by William Nicholson, also a 7d cloth edition (records lost)" The wrappered "Colonial edition" is in the Columbia University Library; we have not yet located a cloth-bound copy.
Williams and Starrett record a 1916 Heinemann Pictures of War. Bruccoli's copy is a new edition, part of "Heinemann's 1s. net Novels" series, and contains only the stories in The Little Regiment. (The first edition of Pictures of War included The Little Regiment stories and The Red Badge of Courage.) Both the Columbia University Library and Bruccoli have copies of The Red Badge of Courage in pictorial wrappers published by Heinemann in 1900 at 6d. The running title in this volume is 'PICTURES OF WAR,' and it is almost certain that this book was printed from the original plates of Pictures of War.
Although War Is Kind was offered to Heinemann, as Brett states: "Half a dozen copies of the American Edition had a Heinemann Title page for purposes of Copyright. It was not published in England." Either Stephen or Cora Crane managed to get a Heinemann file copy of War Is Kind. It is now in the Columbia University Library, and it helps to clarify Brett's description. As we have noted in The Stephen Crane Newsletter, this book is a copy of the Stokes edition with the Heinemann imprint stamped on the title page.[6]
By the time Active Service was completed on 13 May 1899, Crane was living at Brede Place.[7] One would therefore expect that, as was usual under such circumstances, an English edition would be set from the manuscript and that an American edition would be set from the English print. This was not the case with Active Service. In the Columbia University Library there survive a typescript and a partial proof for the Heinemann edition. The typescript has two versions of Chapter VI, a ribbon copy and a carbon copy. The proof includes both of these versions. Evidently the compositors setting the Heinemann edition reproduced the duplicated chapters from the typescript, but of course the duplication was caught before the book went to press. The version removed from the proof appears in the American edition published by Stokes. In the Stokes edition there are other, numerous differences from the text of the Heinemann edition. Clearly, the textual evidence is that each edition was set independently from a separate typescript; and the duplicate sixth chapter in the surviving typescript is a carbon of the script used by Stokes.
Brett notes only that Active Service was "Published November 2nd 1899, also a Colonial edition cloth and paper. No reprints." Bruccoli has a copy from "Heinemann's Colonial Library of Popular Fiction" in red P
Katz has a copy of the London issue of Active Service that represents a separate publisher's binding. This copy is the same as the primary binding, but the sheets have been trimmed to 7 14/32” x 4¾” and the publisher's catalogue has been omitted. Both Bruccoli and Katz have copies of a Canadian printing from the American plates. The title page imprint is: "TORONTO : / WILLIAM BRIGGS. / 1899." The sheets in this impression are .005” thick, whereas the Stokes sheets are .006”. This Canadian printing is bound in the same style as the American, but it is stamped in red and green and has the Briggs imprint on the lower spine.
For Bowery Tales Brett notes: "Published June 23rd 1900. Also a Colonial edition cloth and paper. No reprints." We have not yet located a copy of the "Colonial edition." Syracuse University Library and Bruccoli, however, have copies in blue V cloth with the Times Book Club seal on the spine. The title page is integral and reads:
We are fortunate in having seen Methuen's records for Wounds in the Rain.[8] There were two printings of 2500 and 1000 copies each. Apparently there was a colonial issue — in both cloth and wrappers — of the first printing. In 1905 650 cancel titles were printed, of which 300 were used for "1/- Novels" — that is, to convert unsold sheets into a cheap re-issue. We have not yet located a copy of the shilling re-issue.
As we noted in The Stephen Crane Newsletter (I [Winter 1966], 3-4), Great Battles of the World was issued by Bell's Indian & Colonial Library (London & Bombay, 1901) in printed wrappers; and a copy in red T cloth
That, as BAL #4096 suggests, some copies of Last Words were distributed by the Times Book Club is established by three copies trimmed to 7 3/32” x 4 13/16”, all with the Times Book Club label: blue-grey V cloth (Bruccoli); brown V cloth and red V cloth (Library of Congress). Last Words was also issued in "Bell's Indian & Colonial Library" (London & Bombay, 1902). The Bruccoli copy in printed wrappers appears to be a re-issue of the original sheets. This copy includes a catalogue that lists Great Battles and The Monster as part of the series. That these three titles were originally published in England by other firms and re-issued in "Bell's Indian & Colonial Library" strongly suggests that the Bell series was a graveyard for unsold sheets.
| | |