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WAUGH, EVELYN
Black
Mischief
Chapman and
Hall Ltd, London,
1932
First edition
Octavo
This book
tells the story of a fictional island off the east cost of Africa called
Azania, ruled by the English educated Seth who is determined to drag
his kingdom into the modern age. To this end he enlists the help of his
Oxford educated acquaintance
Basil Seal, a recurring figure in Waugh’s
novels, who is an enterprising and immoral member of the 1920s smart
set. This leads to many comically disastrous escapades.
However,
behind the comedy Waugh
shows a shrewd grasp
of the wider forces at work in the colonial
scramble,
and the book swirls with subversive cross currents making it the
funniest of his early books.
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Bound
in terracotta
morocco with hand-stencilled Japanese decorative endpapers,
gilt edges, and onlays of tan,
chocolate and orange leathers
with blind
gouge work depicting an African figure with his back to us. The
circular lettering panel of orange is the sun going down on the
savanna. Housed in a leather entry slipcase
to match.
BKWAUG.005
£2,000.00 |
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