With a memoir of E.T. Leeds by D.B. Harden. Illustrated with line drawings by Richard Kennedy. Black and white frontispiece and twenty-four plates taken from photographs. With an additional folio of proofs of Richard Kennedy’s illustrations. First edition. One of 80 numbered copies of a total edition of 750. This is copy number XIV. 8vo., original Nigerian Goatskin gilt. With marbled endpapers by Colleen Gryspeerdt. Top edges stained red, fore and lower edges uncut. Slipcase. Andoversford, The Whittington Press, 1988.
At the time of its publication this was probably the most important volume of writing by Lawrence to have been published since the Home Letters of 1954, and its success provided something of a template for the editor’s extraordinary series of Lawrence books published by his Castle Hill Press. Leeds was an archaeologist in Oxford and an early friend of Lawrence. The correspondence, which consists of some 50 letters is largely continuous from 1909-1935 and is important not only for its continuity but also for the light it sheds on his light-hearted approach to life before the War. Leeds was particularly keen that his friendship with Lawrence not be exploited, and the correspondence was unknown prior to publication.
