Bloomsbury Group Interest

Dobree, Valentine ~ The Emperor’s Tigers (Bloomsbury Group Interest)

Faber and Faber, London : 1929

The sole UK printing published by Faber and Faber, London in 1929. Original publisher's green cloth, spine lettered in gilt; upper edge top- stained purple, else untrimmed; striking decorative endpapers matching wrapper design (unattributed artist), priced 6s. net to the front flap; The BOOK is in Very Good++ or better condition with a couple of splash marks and scratches to the upper edge; lightly bumped to spine tips; The WRAPPER is in Very Good condition, retaining much of its original colour, with moderate splitting along the spine and folds. The front flap is detached. There are some losses to the ends of the spine and folds; spine a touch toned. The striking wrapper however comes together very well and is protected in a removable Brodart archival cover. An interesting work, the second novel by the visual artist, novelist and poet Valentine Dobree. Dobree (nee Gladys May Mabel Brooke-Pechell) was born in India in 1894, and studied art under the tutelage of Andre Derain. In 1913 she married Bonamy Dobrée, and after the war traveled to London, where she became involved with the London Group and the Bloomsbury Group. She began an affair with the painter Mark Gertler, who produced two portraits of her - one in 1919 and the other in 1920. Her first, semi-autobiographical book, ‘Your Cuckoo Sings by Kind’, was published in 1929, and 'The Emperor's Tigers', with more fantastical undertones, followed shortly after. Dobree's works were much admired by writers such as T. S. Eliot and Graham Greene, though are little known today. Better remembered are her surrealist paintings, though she once described herself as “one who regards the arts as a many-faceted crystal rather than as personified by separate Muses”. A very elusive title, especially so in the striking wrapper.

BINDING: Hardcover
CONDITION: Very Good++
JACKET: Very Good