CONRAD, Joseph (1857-1924). Chance, London, 1913, 8vo, original green cloth gilt. FIRST EDITION. Please see the extensive notes regarding the edition below.

CONRAD, Joseph (1857-1924).  Chance. A Tale in Two Parts. London: Methuen & Co. Ltd., 1913. 8vo (190 x 125mm). Half title, publisher's advertisement on the verso of the title, title with "First Printed in 1913" on the verso, uncancelled and not mounted on a tab, 8-pages of publisher's advertisements dated "Autumn 1913" at the end, followed by 31-pages of publisher's advertisements dated "September 1913" (half title spotted, title cleanly torn at the lower gutter without loss, some other mainly marginal light spotting and staining, more pronounced towards the front, ink spot on page 377). Original green cloth, the spine lettered and decorated in gilt with "METHVEN" at the foot of the spine. Provenance: The Property of a Collector; Ryan Campbell, followed by a third, illegible, name (later pencil signature on front free endpaper); Tauchnitz flyer loosely-inserted. FIRST EDITION, with "First Published in 1913" on the verso of the title and "Colonial Library" stamped in purple ink in small letters beneath the imprint on the front of the title. "Moral isolation is ... the theme of Chance (1914) [sic], which is, again, a very different kind of book - different from Under Western Eyes and from the other novels ... The technical distinction of Chance has not lacked recognition. That no doubt is because Chance invites the description 'technical triumph' in a way which Nostromo and The Secret Agent do not ... The genius is amply apparent in Chance. It is most apparent in the force of realization with which the characters are evoked, and which has led above to the mention of Dickens. That which suggests Dickens in Chance - and there is a great deal of it - is all strongly characteristic of Conrad ... [Chance] is certainly a remarkable novel" (F. R. Leavis, The Great Tradition). "Few 20th-century books have a more complex publishing history than Chance, and even fewer, it would seem, have been the subject of as much bibliographical gossip and conjecture." So opens William R. Cagle's article "The Publication of Joseph Conrad's Chance" in the Autumn 1967 issue of The Book Collector (pp. 305-322) in which the bibliographer identifies no less than 12 different issues of the first edition. The present copy seems to conform most closely to the fourth of these and a pencil note on its front free endpaper [illustrated], which also suggests the numbers of copies printed, would seem to bear this out. Cagle describes this variant as follows: "4. First impression, colonial issue, second state: Issued with a cancel conjugate half-title and title with 'First published in 1913' on the verso of the title. The cancel was supplied when it was decided to issue these colonial copies domestically for which reason they were also bound in the 6s binding. When this decision was reversed and these copies were transferred back to the colonial issue they were rubber stamped 'Colonial Library' on the title-page beneath the imprint. Published as part of the colonial issue at least six weeks before the domestic issue. Two copies examined (Berg Collection, New York Public Library; University of Texas)." Two other issue points in the present copy are the "battered type" (Cagle's term) found at the foot of pages 294 and 299 and "Narcissus" having both sets of quotation marks in the list of the author's works on the verso of the half title, both of which Cagle claims to be indicators of first impressions. However, he also states that in the first impression the "motto" (i.e. the epigram) appears 44mm below the author's name on the title page, whereas in the present copy it appears 49mm beneath, and 5mm might as well be a mile in bibliography. A further article by Donald Rude which appeared in the 1978 Autumn issue of The Book Collector (pp. 343-347) entitled "Joseph Conrad's Chance. An Anomalous Copy of the First Impression of the First British Edition" starts with a similar warning to Cagle's by stating, "... the publication history of Chance ... may well be more complex than that of any other major 20th-century literary work," a conviction he then goes on to exemplify at some length. Cagle A17a; Keating pp.217-219; Smith p.58; Wise 22: "The actual princeps may be readily identified by a reference to the note which stands upon the reverse of the Title-page. In the First Issue this note reads 'First published in 1913'; in the second Issue this note reads 'First published in 1914.' In the case of this book the publishers' advertisement list bound up at the end of the volume may be of service. In some copies of the First issue this list extends to 31 pages dated 'July 1913'; in others the list consists of 8 pages dated 'Autumn 1913'. In the Second issue the 8 page list only is to be found. The binding of both issues is identical." It is interesting to note that the present copy contains both sets of publisher's advertisements. Neither Wise, or his correspondents at Methuen quoted in his bibliography, make any mention of the 'Colonial Library' stamp present in our copy, and recorded in a few others.