The Gentle Shepherd A Pastoral Comedy By Allan Ramsay Beautiful Illustrations & Engraved Leaves of Music Scarce First Edition Thus 1788

The Gentle Shepherd A Pastoral Comedy By Allan Ramsay Beautiful Illustrations & Engraved Leaves of Music Scarce First Edition Thus 1788

<Condition is Good as Pictured (medium wear with markings, pages are lightly soiled & smudged throughout, text-block is sound, some small rips on page bottoms) rebound in Half-Leather, size is approximately 10X12 quarto

1788 First Edition thus or First Illustrated Edition of this widely popular pastoral comedy in vernacular Scots, with glossary and evocative engravings by David Allan. Large Quarto:with portrait frontispiece, 12 numbered uncolored aquatints by David Allan, and 9 engraved leaves of music and words, numbered 1-18. Text based on quarto edition of 1728.

->>The Foulis Press first published The Gentle Shepherd (which was originally published by, in 1725, in Edinborough, Glasgow, and London) in 1743, then again in 1745, 1747, 1750, and 1752, before issuing this handsomely illustrated edition in 1788. The play was first performed as a ballad opera in 1747, from which the supplemental eighteen pages of engraved songs were taken. David Allan (1744-1796), known as “the Scottish Hogarth, explains in the dedication, which prominently follows directly on the title page: “It will be easily seen that I am not a master in the mechanical part of this art: but my chief intention was not to offer expensive and smooth engravings, but expressive and characteristic designs.” Thus the conscious naivety of his style echoes the simplicity of the country folk whom he depicts. His twelve plates were the first use in Scotland of aquatints for book illustration.

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