The Common Reader. by WOOLF, Virginia - 1925

New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company,, 1925. For pleasure has no relish unless we share it First US edition, first printing, uncommon in the original dust jacket, published only a couple of weeks after the first UK edition. This is the first of the two volumes of Woolf's Common Reader, each series being a discrete work in its own right; the second was published in 1932. The Common Reader series comprise critical essays, articles, and book reviews that had previously appeared in various publications. "Woolf was trying to bring imagination and cohesion to a disparate collection, unified only by her approach and personality... The Times itself saw Woolf as 'a novelist deliberately using her creative imagination' and praised her for 'conduct[ing] us not into the classroom but out of it'" (Clarke, introduction). Octavo. Original red cloth, spine lettered and ruled in gilt, border and publisher's device in blind to front cover, outer and bottom edge untrimmed. Faint toning to foot of front cover, foxing to edges, contents generally fresh and clean. A very good copy indeed, in very good dust jacket, a little toned and rubbed, head of spine panel creased with small chip and nick, short closed tear to front flap at fold, front panel remaining quite bright. Kirkpatrick A8b. Stuart N. Clarke (ed.), The Essays of Virginia Woolf, Volume 5: 1929-1932, 2017.