An Austen family copy, from the library of Edward Knatchbull-Hugessen (1829-1893), Jane Austen’s grandnephew, in a beautiful Regency binding. It is uncommon to find Jane Austen titles in contemporary bindings and even more so with such intimate provenance.
Edward Knatchbull was likely gifted the present copy of Mansfield Park, along with Austen’s four other published novels, by his mother Fanny Knight (Frances Catherine Austen Knight, Lady Knatchbull 1793-1882). Four of the five novels were uniformly bound, and the first volume of Mansfield Park bears the inscription “Edward Knatchbull 1838” which is probably in his mother’s hand. Fanny Knight often described as Austen’s favourite niece, was the daughter of Jane Austen’s third eldest brother Edward Knight (formerly Austen).
In 1884, almost seventy years after Jane Austen’s death, Edward Knatchbull-Hugessen, then Lord Brabourne, published a two-volume collection of Austen’s letters which he had inherited from his mother. These letters make up over half of the total surviving correspondence from Jane Austen and constitute a significant contribution to our understanding of her life and personality. Austen wrote no autobiographical notes or diaries, and her sister Cassandra destroyed or redacted many of her letters; which she may have felt were too personal in nature to be passed on. The manuscript material passed on to Edward Knatchbull from Fanny Knight included letters from Jane Austen to Fanny, as well as the bulk of the letters from Jane Austen to her sister Cassandra, and the previously unpublished manuscript of Lady Susan, now at the Morgan Library. The letters which Jane Austen wrote to her niece Fanny Knight contain more on the subject of love, marriage and courtship than any other surviving Austen correspondence and so naturally are of special interest to Austen scholars and admirers alike.
An exceptional set, with expert and subtle reinforcements to joints, remnants of old label to the top of spine of volume one, short tear in the gutter of the title page of volume two, and L9, likely a mistake when bound, some offsetting from green silk place holder.
Provenance: Edward Huggesen Knatchbull-Huggesen, 1st Baron Brabourne (1829-1893), in the sale of his library at Puttick & Simpson on 26th–28th June, 1893, Lot 20, [with Sense and Sensibility, and Pride and Prejudice], sold to Quaritch.
Gilson, A7. In volume three, on p.256 the catchword is misprinted as 'CHAB.' for 'CHAP.' as in some copies noted by Gilson, and as in the Bodleian copy the catchword on p. 331 is misprinted 'fluenc' rather than 'fluence'.
