The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats. Stratford-on-Avon: Imprinted at the Shakespeare Head Press, 1908. First Edition, Limited Issue. Bound in publisher’s quarter vellum and light grey boards. Scuff marks to tail of volumes 7 & 8, light shelf-wear to boards & browning to endpapers, contents generally clean & bright throughout.

First collected edition of Yeats’s works. This set is one of only 250 (within a total issue the 1060) issued in quarter vellum with the Chapman & Hall imprint on the title page and spine. Photogravure frontispiece portraits after drawings by John S. Sargent (Volume I), Charles Shannon (Volume III), A. Mancini (Volume V), and John B. Yeats (Volume VII). Titles printed in red and black. [Wade 75-82].

Inserted is a Post Card with short message in Yeats’s hand postmarked London, 5th May 1916 (shortly after the Easter Rising).

Selected and arranged by Yeats himself, he was extremely pleased with this production, commenting that “I think nobody of our time has had so fine an edition I believe it will greatly strengthen my position”.

Yeats is generally considered one of the few writers who completed their greatest works in the latter stages of their career. After being awarded the Nobel Prize in 1923 at the age of 58 he went on to publish works of outstanding merit  such as ‘The Tower’ (1928) and ‘The Winding Stair and Other Poems’ (1933).