GIBBON, (Monk)

The Branch of the Hawthorn Tree

Inscription (to Hubert and Patsy Dingwall) and unpublished autograph poem by the author on the front free endpaper and verso (signed). One of a limited numbered edition of 460 copies, this number 14. Hand-coloured illustrations by Picart Le Doux. Large 8vo, original wrappers; the glassine only present in part. London: Grayhound Press. 1927, 1927.

£100.00

Inscription by the author Monk Gibbon, poet, known as The Grand Old Man of Irish Letters, “for dear Hubert and Patsy” dated “1947”, “Finchley”; poem titled “Poet and Young Girl. A l’ombre d’une jeune fille. Kuhtai 1935.” Poem comprising 8 stanzas. In his inscription Gibbon writes that the poem is “mentioned in “Mount Ida” (that book with which they contended in typescript long before it came to be inflicted on the general public.)” Mount Ida, Gibbon’s autobiographical work on the theme of love was published in 1948.

The poem, rather melancholic in tone but with a quiet beauty, records an episode of unrequited love and the ephemeral nature of such passions.

“But you, what joy is yours, who gave the theme;

The mute accomplice in this theft from time,

Your beauty lingering like some lovely shade

Besides the Lethe of a soon-lost rhyme […]

The god [Cupid] will pass, the grove will silent grow

Whatever arrows speed there soon be flown,

Leaving within your hands not even this -

The barren leafage of a laurel crown.“

Also inscribed by the recipient “J. Hubert Dingwall.”

Slightly dusty, glassine wrapper damaged (only half remains).

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Stock No.
225702