Travels in Arabia Deserta (Folio Society Limited Deluxe Edition)

T. E. Lawrence championed Doughty’s masterpiece back into print in 1921; this is the Folio Society’s 2013 limited edition, number 159 of 780, half-bound in goatskin with the author’s own map.

Charles Montagu Doughty (1843–1926) set out from Damascus in 1876 and spent twenty-one months in the Arabian Peninsula, reaching the Red Sea at Jeddah in 1878. He travelled with Bedouin tribes through the Hejaz and Nejd, in conditions of intermittent danger, poverty and extraordinary physical beauty. He was an Englishman and a Christian in a country inhospitable to both. He survived through stubbornness, medical knowledge, and the protection of individual Bedouin who chose, against the customs of the region, to keep him alive. He carried no camera, only drawings, diagrams and notes. He wrote the book between 1879 and 1884 and went on revising it until it appeared, a decade after he had left Arabia.

Travels in Arabia Deserta was published by Cambridge University Press in 1888 in an edition limited to 500 copies, priced at three guineas. It found its champion in T. E. Lawrence, who used it as a guide on his own journeys across Arabia and was instrumental in the second English edition of 1921. That edition, again of 500 copies, was published by the Medici Society and Jonathan Cape, whose first book it was. Lawrence’s introduction first appeared there, and it is reprinted here.

The Folio Society published this edition in 2013. It follows the text of Cape’s “new and definitive” edition of 1936 and adds a new preface by Rory Stewart. The illustrations include the drawings Doughty made for the first edition and period photographs from the Fine Arts Library at Harvard, many by the Bonfils studio in Beirut and many never before reproduced. The map is the one Doughty drafted on his travels and presented to the Royal Geographical Society on his return. It is mounted separately so that it can be consulted alongside the text.

Limited deluxe edition. Limited to 780 numbered copies for sale (plus 20 lettered copies not for sale), this being number 159. Preface by Rory Stewart; introduction by T. E. Lawrence; illustrations by Félix Bonfils, et al.; marbled paper by Jemma Lewis. Large Octavo. Vol. I: lii, 610 pp; Vol. II: xvi, 644 pp. Both text volumes half-bound in Indian goatskin by Lachenmaier, Reutlingen, Germany, with marbled paper sides by Jemma Lewis. Spines lettered in gilt. Top edges gilt. Light brown endpapers. Text printed on wove paper. Approximately 200 integrated illustrations throughout; 52 pages of duotone plates printed on art silk paper, mainly after photographs by Félix Bonfils and others. Map volume: large folding coloured map of Doughty's route, mounted in panels on linen and case-bound in Arbelave library buckram; limitation statement on front pastedown. Dark brown buckram slipcase with gilt-lettered morocco title-label to spine. Mild foxing along edges of volumes; all contents present, bright, and clear throughout.

Please note: This item is a large and very heavy three-component set. Additional postage costs will apply. Please contact us for a shipping quote before purchase.

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Catalogue Number: HH000582