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Old September 7th 05, 08:37 PM
John R. Yamamoto-Wilson
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I wrote:

According to some of the COPAC entries, this book was first issued
in 42 parts, and I would have expected loose copies of the parts to be
knocking around. Yet there are none.


Michael Adams replied:

The Edinburgh copy is one such.


You mean it is bound from the parts? Yes, it would appear so, from the
description.

It seems rather a coincidence though that the book calls for 42 plates.


Not a coincidence. Each of the original parts would have contained one
plate. Copies bound from the parts would therefore have contained 42
plates. Copies printed from the same blocks after the part run had run
out would also have contained 42 plates.

Also 42 seems a rather odd figure for a part work as against 12, 24, etc.


I won't quibble with that. I don't recall coming across a 42-part work
before, though I've not really come across works in 12 or 24 parts
either. I've had a few Dickens firsts bound from the parts, and the
standard for novels in the 19th century was 20 parts issued in 19
instalments (the final issue contained two parts). Other than that, I
can't really say.

Also the Dublin edition was published more or less contemporaneously,
if the 1792 in most of the descriptions of the Dublin edition are to
be believed, which would be a bit difficult unless the Title Pages
and prefaces of both Editions were issued last.


Well, without having copies to hand it is difficult to say, but the
Cambridge and National Library of Scotland entries on COPAC give a
putative date of 1792-96, and the Edinburgh copy notes that it is the
*preface* which is dated 1792. Other copies are catalogued as undated.

I think we can assume that the book itself is undated as such, that the
preface (which is dated) came out with the first part in 1792, and that
the ensuing parts were issued monthly, which is why it is assumed by
some cataloguers that the final part was issued in 1796.

Again its doubtful if there would be sufficient market for a part work
in Dublin.


Oh, I don't know. The Protestant ascendancy had to do *something* other
than collect rents, live on the fat of the land and play the oppressor!
Why would they not leaf through a monthly journal on the pastimes of
the fine, upstanding British gentleman?

But perhaps you are right. Anyway, there is no evidence that the parts
were issued serially in Ireland, only that the finished product was
published there in book form.

John
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