Wuthering Heights [Bound With:] Now & Then Brontë, Emily; Warren, Samuel Lit

First US edition of the wild Gothic tale of romance and betrayal, published only a few months after the nearly unobtainable London first, bound with another novel, NOW & THEN by Samuel Warren, published by Harper the same year. The tale of the moors remains one of the most polarizing novels in the English tradition, yet its preeminence in that tradition is beyond doubt. Brutality and passion drive the plot, which is subtly executed with a virtuosity unmatched even by the author's famed sisters. The complexity of the main characters, who exhibit equally dramatic virtues and vices, was a provocative choice in the Victorian era, when protagonists typically acted with exemplary conduct. As a result, the story of Catherine and Heathcliff has become a turbulent dream of our collective psyche. This copy has been bound with another imprint from the same publisher, Samuel Warren's NOW & THEN, a historical novel beginning with a country family's home under threat from the land expansions of a nearby earl. Warren was a best-selling British novelist of the era; his TEN THOUSAND A YEAR (1840-1) was described by THE AMERICAN JOURNAL as "destined in British literature to some such rank as 'Don Quixote' holds in Spain" (alas). NOW & THEN was praised by the TIMES for its "language as masculine and eloquent as any the English tongue can furnish." This US edition of WUTHERING HEIGHTS was published only a few months after the London, which is legendarily scarce: recent copies have all sold for into the six figures. Emily Brontë would die of tuberculosis only eight months after this edition was published. An important edition of the masterwork that has baffled and intrigued us for generations. 12mo. 7.25'' x 4.75''. Modern full green goatskin, raised bands, gilt-stamped spine and gilt-ruled boards. New marbled endpapers. 290; 288 pages. Significant dampstaining affecting about three-quarters of text block. Boards slightly bowed.