Cooper's Sea Tales – James Fenimore Cooper
An attractive matching three-volume collection of James Fenimore Cooper's Sea Tales, published in New York by the John W. Lovell Company around 1890.
The collection includes:
The Two Admirals: A Tale of the Sea
The Water-Witch
Wing and Wing
The books are uniformly bound in dark green textured cloth with gilt rules and lettering to the spines, including the collective title "Cooper's Sea Tales." Each volume also contains a full-page black-and-white illustrated frontispiece depicting a scene from the story.
These three books were issued as part of Cooper's Sea Tales grouping. The complete First Series consisted of five titles, with The Pilot and The Red Rover completing the collection. This offering contains three of the five volumes and is therefore a partial set, not a complete set.
James Fenimore Cooper (1789–1851), best known for The Last of the Mohicans, was one of the most important early American novelists. In addition to his celebrated frontier fiction, Cooper was a pioneer of the nautical novel. His sea stories drew upon his own experience as a sailor and helped establish maritime adventure as a major literary genre during the nineteenth century.
The John W. Lovell Company was a prolific New York publisher of affordable editions of classic and popular literature during the late nineteenth century. These undated volumes bear the publisher's 150 Worth Street, corner Mission Place imprint, consistent with Lovell publications of the period.
Condition
Good+ to Very Good antique condition. The three volumes retain an especially attractive matching appearance, with strong dark green cloth and bright gilt spine lettering. There is light rubbing and shelf wear to the boards and some wear and fraying at the spine ends, most noticeably at the head of The Two Admirals. Page edges show expected toning and discoloration from age. Interiors are generally clean with attractive, sharply printed illustrations. Please review photographs carefully for the condition of each volume.
A handsome group of late-19th-century American literary classics with particularly strong shelf presence—well suited to a collection of maritime literature, James Fenimore Cooper, early American fiction, or decorative antique books.
Three matching volumes from an originally larger five-volume Sea Tales series.
