Women's Voices

London: Walter Scott. 1887.

First edition. 8vo. 190x125mm. pp. xx, 419 [1bl]. Original blue cloth with an illustration in gilt by Phoebe Traquair on the upper cover (her monogram is at the bottom right corner of the cover). Spine lettered and illustrated in gilt. The frontispiece was also designed by Traquair. Some fading to spine and bumping and wear to head and foot of spine and rubbing to corners. Endpapers chipped at the front inner gutter but otherwise a very nice copy of an important collection of women's writing by Elizabeth Sharp. She makes clear in the preface that this anthology has been a labour of love but there is no doubting her intention to address the fact that "our women-poets had never been collectively represented with anything like adequate justice".
This was Sharp's first book: she went on to publish numerous anthologies and historical works and was a leading figure in the Celtic revival. Phoebe Traquair (1852-1936) was one of the leading figures in the Arts and Crafts Movement producing large scale works such as her celebrated church murals in Edinburgh together with (in the Arts and Crafts spirit) more minor key ventures such as embroidery and, as here, book illustration. Greatly influenced by Ruskin and pre-Raphaelites her work has a gorgeous economy and sinuousness much in evidence on the cover of Sharp's anthology.