CONRAD, Joseph (1857-1924). The Secret Agent, London, 1907, 8vo, half title, 40-pages of publisher's advertisements at the end dated September 1907 (some spotting and staining), original red cloth gilt (extremities rubbed). FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE.

CONRAD, Joseph (1857-1924).  The Secret Agent. A Simple Tale. London: Methuen & Co., 1907. 8vo (190 x 125mm). Half title with publisher's advertisement on the verso, preceded by a blank leaf, 40-pages of publisher's advertisements at the end dated September 1907 (some spotting to the first few leaves including the title, marginal stain to two leaves, occasional light spotting and staining). Original red cloth, the spine lettered and decorated in gilt (extremities rubbed, some light scuffing and staining, some light abrasion to endpapers, possible signifying the removal of a label or signature, lower inner hinges split). Provenance: The Property of a Collector; some inconspicuous pencil annotation to endpapers. FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE, with "be be" in the final line of p.117, "Whpt" on p.397 and "himsel" on p.426. The book was issued without a dust-jacket. Barzun & Taylor 903 A Catalogue of Crime: "... the earliest and best novel portraying the character and fate of a double agent ..."; Cagle A12a; Connolly The Modern Movement 15: "The Secret Agent depicts the atmosphere of Edwardian London in a psychological thriller of the anarchist underworld. Conrad's wit and chivalrous magnanimity are at their airiest in this novel (beloved of Dr Leavis) which is more influential though less grandly Flaubertian than Nostromo" ... [I]t contains Conrad's greatest heroine ..."; Ehrsam p.304; Hubin Crime Fiction IV, p.332; Keating 73; Modern Library Top 100 46; Smith 13; Wise 17: "In a copy of the First Edition of The Secret Agent Mr. Conrad has written the following interesting note:- 'This novel, suggested by the well-known attempt to blow up the Observatory in Greenwich, is based on two pieces of information: one that the perpetrator was a half-witted youth, the other that his sister committed suicide some time afterwards. As literary aim the book is an attempt to treat consistently a melodramatic subject ironically'."