King-Hall, Edith “Adventures in Toyland” [Blackie & Son, n.d./c1897]

KING-HALL, Edith Adventures in Toyland.

London, Glasgow & Dublin: Blackie & Son, Ltd., n.d. [c1897]. First edition. 9.25” x 7”, 152pp with 78 illustrations, including 8 full-page color plates by Alice B. Woodward. Publisher's pictorial blue cloth stamped in green, black, white, and gilt, with elaborate toy-themed cover design and matching pictorial spine. All edges gilt. Contemporary Christmas 1897 gift inscription. Hinges sound and intact. A few scattered spots of foxing, most noticeable on the frontispiece tissue guard and adjacent leaves; binding bright with only light rubbing at extremities. Very Good+.

A charming late-Victorian fantasy in which a young girl enters a world inhabited by toys, marionettes, animals, and other playthings brought to life. The book belongs to the rich tradition of imaginative children's literature that flourished in the decades between Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz, when toyshops, nurseries, and dream worlds became fertile settings for children's fantasy. Alice B. Woodward's illustrations are a particular attraction. One of the most accomplished British illustrators of her generation, Woodward brought warmth, humor, and a distinctly Art Nouveau sensibility to her depictions of animated toys and nursery creatures.