The Monk by Matthew Gregory (M.G.) Lewis Pirate edition c1840

[London: W. Dugdale, c.1840?]
 
8vo., original brown publisher’s cloth, embossed with decorative borders in blind to covers
and spine; lettered in gilt to the backstrip; yellow endpapers; pp [ii], 190; containing 23
in-text illustrations; boards with some small water and ink stains; a little bumped and
frayed at spine ends; cracked at hinges, with some webbing showing, but holding firm;
some pencil markings to front free endpaper and paste-down; internally lightly spotted
throughout, with some corner creases and finger marks, some short nicks and closed tears
to edges, some extending into text; one or two folded corners; a very good copy of an
unusual edition.
 
A bibliographically-interesting edition of Lewis’s principle work of gothic fiction, with no
publisher’s date or imprint. W. Dugdale had published an edition of The Monk in 1840 which
contained the same illustrations present here, and was bound from the original parts. It is
likely that this copy, with continuous page numbering and duplicating these same
illustrations, is a pirate copy of that same edition. This is further evidenced by the lack of
one engraving, and the poor print quality.