Sordello, a History and a Poem.
Inscribed
Dall, Caroline H. Sordello. A History and a Poem. Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1886.
Bound together with:
Dall, Wm. H., et al. Proceedings at a Meeting Commemorative of the Life and Scientific Work of Spencer Fullerton Baird. Held January 11, 1888, under the joint auspices of the Anthropological, Biographical, and Philosophical Societies of Washington. With photographic frontispiece and tissue guard. (Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1888.)
8vo.; interleaved with lined paper; gutters cracked; three-quarter morocco, marbled boards; spine stamped in gilt; lightly edgeworn and rubbed.
First edition of Sordello, bound together with the Proceedings. A presentation copy, inscribed on the front endpaper: For Charles Connor – Nov. 25, 1906 In exchange for a “Sordello” pamphlet that I wanted. Sordello is one of Dall’s few attempts at literary criticism. Published in 1886, it is arranged in two parts: a description of Sordello’s life followed by an examination of Robert Browning’s eponymic long poem of 1840, devoted to the 13th-century Italian troubadour who served in court in Provence and wrote in Provençal. Dante, it is noted, gave Sordello a patriot’s status in Purgatorio, VI, p. 73.
The second volume, Proceedings at a Meeting Commemorative of the Life and Scientific Work of Spencer Fullerton Baird, includes the lecture of Dall’s husband William H. Dall, who wrote, as the President of the Biological Society, “Professor Baird in Science.” Other contributors include Garrick Mallery, William B. Taylor, and J. W. Powell.
These two volumes are bound together, interleaved with lined paper for note taking. On the first lined leaf, after Dall’s “Note,” she has quoted a reference to her own work: “All that need be known concerning the frame work of ‘Sordello’ and of the real Sordello himself will be found in the various Browning hand-books, in Mr. [ ]’s and other dissertations and particularly in Mrs. Dall’s most circumspect and able historical essay. / Life of Robert Browning by William Sharp, p. 107 Walter Scott London – 1890.”
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