Sold for $6,250

8vo. Half-title; 4-page publisher's advertisements at end. (A few mostly marginal pale stains.) Original plain grey wrappers, pale manuscript title on upper wrapper, untrimmed (some minor chipping to top edge, some minor soiling); morocco-backed slipcase.

FIRST EDITION, containing the first printings of three of Coleridge's most celebrated poems.  Coleridge began writing Christabel as early at 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.

[With:]

COLERIDGE, Samuel Taylor. -- COLERIDGE, Henry Nelson, editor. The Literary Remains of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. London: William Pickering, 1836. 2 volumes (of 4), lacking vols.III-IV,  8vo (215 x 132 mm). Contemporary calf gilt, spines gilt in six compartments, black and brown morocco gilt lettering-pieces to spines, marbled edges; slipcase. FIRST EDITION. NCBEL 3:220.