8vo (204 x 128 mm). Half-title. (Lacking 4pp. advertisements, a few tiny spots.) 20th-century teal crushed levant gilt, edges gilt, stamp-signed by Sangorski & Sutcliffe (some very slight fading). Provenance: Paul Francis Webster (1907-1984), American lyricist (morocco bookplate; his sale, Sotheby's New York, 24 April 1985, lot 17).

FIRST EDITION, containing the first printings of three of Coleridge's most celebrated poems.  Coleridge began writing "Christabel" as early as 1803. "Kubla Khan," which Coleridge composed one night after he experienced an opium-influenced dream in 1797, could not be completed according to his original plan; while writing, Coleridge was interrupted by "a person from Porlock," and the interruption caused him to forget the lines.  He would read the poem periodically to the Wordsworths, Lord Byron, and other friends, and in April 1816, Byron persuaded him to publish the visionary Kubla Khan and Christabel. Ashley I, p.204; Grolier English 70; Hayward 207; Tinker 693; Wise Coleridge 32.