From Rodney Rogers, Shrewsbury, United Kingdom
AbeBooks Seller Since November 8, 2010
Seller Rating
About this Item
Blue cloth with gilt lettering to front and spine. 135 x 197 x 40mm. 347pp + publisher's catalogue. Blind-stamped publisher's device to rear board; top and fore-edges untrimmed. A few minor grubby marks on boards and four or five small pale spots on spine; page-edges darkened/dusty; previous owner name, date and monogram to front endpapers; text clean, binding sound. From Valancourt Books website: 'Based on the author's boarding school experiences at Radley College in the late 1870s, Jaspar Tristram (1899) is an extraordinary psychological study of the eponymous hero, tracing his thoughts and emotions as he proceeds from boyhood towards young adulthood: his unhappiness at school, his affection for the older boy Orr and later his love for his friend L. C. 'Elsie' Southwood. As A. D. Harvey writes [.], it is 'one of the most painfully convincing portrayals of adolescence ever written'. Though presented in the safer guise of a story of 'schoolboy friendships', it is also one of the earliest gay-themed English novels ever written. Edward Ashley Walrond Clarke was born in 1860. From 1876 to 1879, he was a pupil at Radley College, experiences which would later serve as the basis for his only novel, Jaspar Tristram (1899). This book inspired mixed reviews: some critics thought it a masterpiece and compared it favourably with the works of Henry James, while others considered it dull and morbid. Though the novel did not sell well enough to run into a second edition, it gained a cult popularity in gay literary circles, being avidly read by Oscar Wilde, Edward Carpenter, and Marc-André Raffalovich among others, and may well have been an influence on E. M. Forster's Maurice and Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited. Little is known about Clarke's life, except that he joined the Foreign Office in 1881 and by 1909 was stationed in Zanzibar, where he died of heart failure in 1913.' A very scarce first edition first printing of this interesting work of fiction, widely considered one of the first 'homosexual novels' published in English. NB: An extra shipping charge may be requested for heavier or more valuable items. All our 'Seller Images' show the actual item you will receive. Seller Inventory # 008610
Bibliographic Details
Title: Jaspar Tristram: A Story
Publisher: William Heinemann, London
Publication Date: 1899
Binding: Hardcover
Condition: Very Good
Edition: First edition
Store Description
Seller name: Rodney Rogers. Seller postal address: 4 Crowsnest, Snailbeach,
Shrewsbury, Shropshire, United Kingdom SY5 0LU. Seller email address:
rodney.rogers@talktalk.net. Seller telephone number: 07854 945848.
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