A documented literary association copy with house-library provenance and laid-in authorial manuscript material.
Offered is a 1918 revised second edition of Young E. Allison’s The Delicious Vice: Pipe Dreams and Fond Adventures of an Habitual Novel-Reader Among Some Great Books and Their People. Published in Chicago by The Prairieland Publishing Co.
This is not the 1907 first edition; it is the genuine 1918 “Second Edition (Revised and containing new material)” stated on the title page.
Exceptional association and provenance
This copy is warmly inscribed and signed by Young E. Allison to Robert Frothingham, dated December 1918. Robert Frothingham (1865–1937) was a writer, journalist, editor, travel author, and compiler of Houghton Mifflin’s “Songs of” anthologies, including Songs of Men in 1918.
The book was acquired by the present seller with Frothingham’s former Adirondack summer home, known as “Topside,” near Great Sacandaga Lake, New York. It was found in the house library. In other words, this is not simply a signed copy: it is a presentation copy that remained in the recipient’s own library.
The Young Ewing Allison Papers at the Filson Historical Society independently list Robert Frothingham–Allison correspondence, 1917–1932, documenting their contemporary relationship.
Laid-in handwritten manuscript material
Laid in with the book are the original handwritten manuscript pages/fragment shown in the photographs. The wording, including the discussion of Becky Sharp, Captain Dobbin, and Amelia, corresponds to Allison’s published text in Chapter VI, “Rascals,” of The Delicious Vice. The pages show working revisions and cancellations.
The manuscript material is offered exactly as found with the book and has not been removed, restored, taped, flattened, or otherwise altered. Buyers should examine every photograph and make their own judgment regarding handwriting, condition, and significance.
Bibliographic details
•Author: Young E. Allison (Young Ewing Allison, 1853–1932)
•Title: The Delicious Vice
•Full subtitle: Pipe Dreams and Fond Adventures of an Habitual Novel-Reader Among Some Great Books and Their People
•Edition: Second Edition, revised and containing new material
•Publisher: The Prairieland Publishing Co.
•Place / date: Chicago,