SIR QUIXOTE OF THE MOORS Buchan, John Authors' First Books,Fiction (19th Century)

Being some Account of an Episode in the Life of the Sieur de Rohaine. London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1895. 4 pp undated ads. Original black cloth decorated in red, green, pink and yellow. First Edition of John Buchan's first book, taking place in the Galloway Hills at the time of the Covenanters. The first-person narrative presents the story of Jean de Rohaine, a French gentleman who, after falling into despair, finds himself wandering the inhospitable Scottish Highlands. The book explores themes of honor, friendship, and the contrast between pastoral tranquility and the harsh realities of life. [Proj. Gut.] Buchan wrote this romance when he was only seventeen years old, and it was published just before he went up to Oxford. (Years later, when a reprint was suggested, he was horrified: "I don't ever want it republished".) He was equally dissatisfied with the art-nouveau binding, which he labeled (in a letter to Gilbert Murray, the dedicatee) "the most awful conceivable -- a lurid nightmare." Most Buchan collectors today, however, are quite enchanted by the binding. This is an attractive, close-to-fine copy; the binding is in the first state, with the full title on the spine. Blanchard A2; Wolff 890; Smith pp 24-25 & 52-53.