A unique copy of an early edition of Gulliver’s Travels which has clearly been read and carefully marked-up throughout with many hundreds of asterixs, dashes and lines in the margins highlighting particular passages as well as long additional notes on 18pp of tipped-in sheets which compare the different editions of Swift which were available in the 18th-century in an attempt to provide an accurate text.
The first note in this copy is written on the blank recto of the first engraved map before the opening of the main text of the novel and reproduces John Boyle, fifth earl of Cork and Orrery’s conclusion that Gulliver represents, “a moral political romance - to connect vice by shewing its deformity in opposition to the beauty of virtue…”.
Throughout the rest of the volumes there are many marks in the margins which presumably highlight favourite passages or sections of note, there are also many notes in the margins reading “vid note” and these indicate longer notes taken by the reader which are on the many tipped-in sheets that appear throughout this copy.
The first of these sheets includes sections from other editions of Swift work including Hawkesworth’s edition of the Works (London 1755) and Orrery’s Remarks on the Life and Writings of Dr. Jonathan Swift (first published 1752). There are also what appear to be some original notes on these sheets (often signed “CW”), such as on the first set of notes adjacent to (Vol I p.76) where the reader has written “The author probably here intended to escape the fallacious opinions of travellers, on things to them strange [this is taken from Hawkeswoth’s edition of Swift but is followed by]….see a Spectator of Addison’s on the Bantamites + the Cathedral of St Pauls” which has been signed “CW”
Similarly on the next inserted leaf there is a long note on vanity and self importance and a recommendation to read an article in Addison’s Spectator which is signed “CW” and dated July 11 1770.
There are also, on occasions, original notes by the reader next to some passages. For example, at the beginning of Chapter VI in the first part, “Of the Inhabitants of Lilliput” the reader has written in the margin “Bon Bon Bon” (Vol I. p.76) and a rapturous note in the margin of “O! wit unexampled! an irony that never had its fellow” (p.232)
