A Christmas Carol | or, The Miser’s Warning; A Drama in 2 Acts | adapted from Charles Dickens’ story by C.Z. Barnett | wood engravings by E.N. Ellis | introduction by Joel H. Kaplan
Mission [B.C.]: Barbarian Press, 1984. Small quarto, 27.3 x 19.7 cm. Cased in full red cloth; with a printed paper label to the spine and a paper panel, printed in red and black, inset to the centre of the upper cover. The panel runs the height of the boards and is embellished with a wood engraving by E.N. Ellis. Plain red endpapers. Housed in a matching red cloth covered slipcase, with a red silk ribbon pull. pp. [6] iii-xii, [2] 3-49 [7]. Very mild sunning to the spine. The line of adhesive used to tip the front free endpaper to the text-block has split somewhat; and the surface of the first blank, to which the endpaper had been tipped, has lifted along the adhesive line; the endpaper, however, is still firmly in position. Else, a fine copy. The text was set in English Scotch Roman and printed on Zerkall mouldmade paper. The binding was executed by Rasmussen Bindery in North Vancouver. Illustrated with six wood engravings, including an elaborate frontispiece, by E.N. (Edwina) Ellis. The engravings were printed from the blocks and four, excluding the frontispiece, are full page. A wood engraved press device and two printer’s marks by E.N. Ellis further embellish the book. From an edition of 350 unnumbered copies. (Utile Dulci, A10). Item #312
“Dickens’ A Christmas Carol was published on 17 December 1843. On 5 February 1844, barely seven weeks later, its first dramatic adaptation was on stage in London. Written by Edward Stirling, it was authorized by Dickens, who, having been unsuccessful in preventing dramatic piracies of his work, decided to collaborate in some measure. However, on the very night that Stirling’s authorized version opened at the Adelphi, another quite unauthorized version by one C.Z. Barnett appeared at the decidedly down-market Surrey Theatre. It is Barnett’s effort we present here.
This piece, full of the meat of Victorian melodrama, is an outrageous vulgarisation of Dickens in some ways, but gives a fascinating glimpse of how domestic melodrama and ‘Transpontine’ theatre took authors like Dickens to their understanding. Bob Cratchit, the humble clerk, becomes a wise-cracking clown; Fred, Scrooge’s nephew, loses his wreath in a shipwreck (Merchant of Venice, anyone?) but maintains a seasonably stiff upper lip rather than depress his guests; Cratchit is later mugged on his way home, and is financially reprieved by the same nephew; & Scrooge— as Joel Kaplan points out in his Introduction to this edition— ‘looms up as the two-dimensional boogeyman the audiences loved to hiss.’ All in all, this is a delicious slice of less-than-pure Victoriana” — Jan & Crispin Elsted (Barbarian Press Catalogue 1998-99).
Price: $675.00