THE STORY OF THE DISCONTENTED LITTLE ELEPHANT, TOLD IN PICTURES AND RHYME
London, England: Longmans, Green & Co., 1912. First Edition. Hardcover. Landscape Quarto, 10.5 x 7.5 in., Unpaginated (eight leaves of text; seven leaves of plates). Gray paper boards over red cloth spine. Framed pictorial inset of story scene with dark green and black title to cover. Illustrated with seven full-page color plates and numerous black ink drawings. Touch of rubbing to the corners, with bottom rear corner nudged. Very clean interior with light age-toning to text pages (plates are bright). Protected in mylar. Very Good Plus. Item #88660
A very rare, and slightly demented, children's book in VG+ condition. Not a morality tale for the faint-hearted child!
Edith Anna Œnone Somerville (1858 – 1949) was an Irish novelist who habitually signed herself as "E. Œ. Somerville". The eldest of eight children, Somerville grew up in Drishane, Castletownshend, County Cork, She is said to have dominated her sister and brothers in a family where women were encouraged to be bold. She received her primary education at home, and then attended Alexandra College in Dublin. In 1884, she went to Paris for the first of several trips to study art at the Académie Colarossi and Académie Delécluse, and then spent a term at the Westminster School of Art in Dean's Yard, Westminster. At home, riding and painting were her absorbing interests.
Somerville was a devoted sportswoman who, in 1903, had become master of the West Carbery Foxhounds. She was also active in the suffragist movement. She had exhibitions of her pictures in Dublin and in London between 1920 and 1938, and was active as an illustrator of sporting picture books and children's picture books. She died at Castletownshend in October 1949, aged 91, and is buried alongside her cousin, often co-author, and companion Violet Florence Martin at Saint Barrahane's Church, Castletownsend.
Price: $650.00