Carter, John and Pollard, Graham. AN ENQUIRY INTO THE NATURE OF CERTAIN NINETEENTH CENTURY PAMPHLETS. Second Edition. With an Epilogue. Edited by Nicolas Barker & John Collins. 2nd Edn; pp. 10, xii, 400, [11]-44(last 3 blank); frontispiece, 4 plates, 2 appendices, 2 illustrations in Epilogue, index; original cloth; a fine copy. London & Berkeley; Scolar Press; (1983). ***Second edition of the famous expose of the forgeries of T. J. Wise, first published in 1934 and here with additions. [with]
Barker, Nicolas & Collins, John. A SEQUEL TO AN ENQUIRY into the nature of certain nineteenth century pamphlets by John Carter and Graham Pollard. The forgeries of H. Buxton Forman and T. J. Wise re-examined. First Edition, Second Impression; pp. 394, [6](blank); frontispiece, 14 plates, numerous type illustrations, 7 appendices, concise list of sources, index; original papered boards; a fine copy. (Aldershot); Scolar Press/Oak Knoll Books; (1992).
***In 1934 two young booksellers, John Carter and Graham Pollard, electrified the world of books and book-collecting with an exposure of literary forgery on a grand and systematic scale. From the 1880s there had appeared on the market, through sale rooms or private transaction, a steady stream of 'rare' or 'early' editions of works by the Brownings, Swinburne, Morris, Wordsworth, Tennyson, Ruskin, Kipling, Rossetti and others. Using their bibliographic skills and their knowledge of paper, type and ink, Carter and Pollard demonstrated that these publications were not what they purported to be. 'An Enquiry' is a masterly detective story, gripping and exhilarating in the irresistible force of its analysis; and it led to the inevitable question - who was responsible for the crime? The two authors thought they knew, and though they did not make the bald accusation in their book they left the reader in no doubt as to who it was - Thomas James Wise, the great bibliographer and book collector, held in the highest regard both in England and America... [from the Publisher's blurb]. Wise's exposure led to further discoveries, including his collaboration with Harry Buxton Forman, editor of Keats and Shelley. Carter and Pollard had been compiling extra material for a new edition of their work, which was taken over by Nicolas Barker and John Collins after their deaths in the 1970s. This edition includes additional material since unearthed. #67943
