THE AMBER WITCH; THE MOST INTERESTING TRIAL FOR WITCHCRAFT EVER KNOWN ... Translated from the German, by E. A. Friedlaender. London: H. G. Clarke and Co., 1844. Small octavo, pp. [iii-v] vi-xii [13] 14-262, nineteenth-century full brown pebbled leather, titled and richly tooled in gold, yellow coated endpapers, all edge gilt. First edition in English. A translation of Meinhold's MARIA SCHWEIDLER DIE BERNSTEINHEXE ... (1843). Clarke's 1844 edition of THE AMBER WITCH, translated into English by E. A. Friedlaender, preceded John Murray's edition published later the same year. The Murray edition utilized a translation by Lady Duff Gordon, superior to Friedlaender, and the translation often reprinted. Story, set in the time of the Thirty Years War, of a young girl falsely accused of witchcraft -- while the real witch is unsuspected. "A minor masterpiece, still the best novel about witchcraft." - Bleiler, The Guide to Supernatural Fiction 1142. Meinhold "retains a place in the history of supernatural fiction largely because he was a pioneer of the genre. His THE AMBER WITCH (1843) and SIDONIA THE SORCERESS (1847-1848) are generally considered two of the earliest and finest witch novels of the nineteenth century. He was also one of the first to adopt the form, language, and documentary style of the chronicle. He wrote with such finesse that some of his contemporaries were convinced that the chronicles were authentic." - Bleiler, ed., Supernatural Fiction Writers: Fantasy and Horror, p. 121. Praised and discussed at length by Lovecraft, Supernatural Horror in Literature, pp. 46-47. Oddly, the original German edition is not listed in Bloch, Bibliographie der Utopie und Phantastik. Barron, ed., Horror Literature 2-63. Lovecraft, Supernatural Horror in Literature, pp. 46-47. Bleiler (1978), p. 137. Not in Reginald (1979; 1992). Not in Bloch (2002; 2010). Bound without the half title leaf or the publisher's advertisements at the rear. Leather a bit rubbed at edges, a sound, very good copy. (#179039).
Price: $350.00
No statement of printing.