Sketches beyond the Lyonesse.
St. Clether, Launceston, Cornwall.
March, 1879
Quarto.
Manuscript on paper. [82]ff. Naively sewn in contemporary two-tone wrappers. Extremities heavily rubbed, marked, and sunned. Occasional corrections to text.
An apparently unpublished Victorian manuscript, in a single legible hand, a seven-chapter narrative concerning a London-based lawyer who resolves to holiday in the Scilly Isles, a foundation upon which the author presents retellings of events from Arthurian legend.
The author, John Benny Serjeant of St. Clether, Cornwall, completed the manuscript just eight months before his untimely death at the age of twenty-nine in November 1879. His brother, William Serjeant (1849-1872), who had died of pulmonary tuberculosis aged twenty-three, notably conducted a love affair with Emma Gifford (1840-1912), who, knowing Serjeant was terminally ill, ended their relationship in favour of taking up with novelist Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), whom she would marry and remain with until her death. It has been suggested that William Serjeant is the subject of Hardy's haunting poem The Face at the Casement (1871).
£ 375.00
Antiquates Ref: 34204
The author, John Benny Serjeant of St. Clether, Cornwall, completed the manuscript just eight months before his untimely death at the age of twenty-nine in November 1879. His brother, William Serjeant (1849-1872), who had died of pulmonary tuberculosis aged twenty-three, notably conducted a love affair with Emma Gifford (1840-1912), who, knowing Serjeant was terminally ill, ended their relationship in favour of taking up with novelist Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), whom she would marry and remain with until her death. It has been suggested that William Serjeant is the subject of Hardy's haunting poem The Face at the Casement (1871).
