NOW SOLD OUT
YOU MAY FIND COPIES FOR SALE FROM SECONDARY SELLERS... GOOD LUCK!
REDISCOVERED!
LIMITED TO 250 HAND-NUMBERED SETS
TWO LOST TALES FROM THE CREATORS OF FRANKENSTEIN AND DRACULA
'THE GHOST OF THE PRIVATE THEATRICALS'
By 'M.S.' Now attributed to Mary Shelley
and
'GIBBET HILL'
By Bram Stoker
PRESENTED WITH PRINTS BY J.M.W. TURNER OF THE PLACES WHICH INSPIRED THE TALES...
A strictly limited edition of 250 hand-numbered sets for sale.
A5 format, 40pp and 20pp, c15,000 words in total, printed on uncoated stock, including a cover printed on Tintoretto Gesso paper.
Each chapbook is presented with a print on heavy laid paper of an etching after J.M.W. Turner, published to coincide with the 250th anniversary of his birth.
'The Ghost of the Private Theatricals' is a chilling short story, originally printed in the literary annual The Keepsake, credited simply to 'M.S.' Almost entirely forgotten for nearly two centuries, and never included in any collection of Shelley's work, it now reappears at last in this limited edition, with an extended Afterword by Adam Newell, giving the background to the first publication of the story, and presenting the persuasive evidence to show that 'M.S.' is, in fact, Mary Shelley. Newell has also uncovered a contemporary review which could give a clue to the story's origins... This edition comes with a print by J.M.W. Turner of 'Heidelberg', a castle visited by Mary Shelley, which may have inspired the Schloss Trübenstern in the story.
'Gibbet Hill' is an eerie short story by Bram Stoker, which was originally published in an Irish newspaper in 1890, but then forgotten until its recent rediscovery. It is presented here for the first time with a print of 'Hind Head Hill', the image by J.M.W. Turner which directly inspired (and is indeed mentioned in) the tale.
ORDERING DETAILS AND MORE PHOTOS BELOW
Our previous limited editions have all sold out, so don't miss out on this one...
The Slave Race, featuring Philip K. Dick's first SF tale (not in his Collected Stories), sold out in a matter of days (details here). Our two Lawrence of Arabia titles (see details here and here), were described by the T. E. Lawrence Society as "a very beautiful publication" and "a valuable piece of ephemera for your collection". Gods of Darkness, F. Scott Fitzgerald's never-previously-reprinted tale of a Lovecraftian witch cult (yes, you read that right) was an instant sell-out (see here). The 50th anniversary souvenir An Appointment with The Wicker Man (see here) sold out quickly, as did the limited edition of a horror story by Sharon Gosling, Slow Progress (see here).
No copies remain of At the Door of Darkness, a forgotten episode from Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, deleted from the published version, and reconstructed from the original manuscript. Details here. 250 numbered copies of Dracula's Forgotten Brides, a heavily illustrated monograph about Dorothy Tree, Geraldine Dvorak and Cornelia Thaw, the actresses who played opposite Bela Lugosi in Dracula (1931), quickly found new homes around the world. Details here. A monograph on The Croglin Vampire, perhaps the earliest of England's vampire legends, similarly was rapidly dispatched to various continents. Details here. Finally, a limited edition set of Cormac McCarthy's earliest published short stories sold out in under five hours...
You may be able to find copies of some of the above on the secondary market, where they tend to attract prices markedly higher than the original rrp...
MORE PHOTOS BELOW
ORDERING DETAILS AT THE BOTTOM: KEEP SCROLLING!
TO ORDER THIS CHAPBOOK SET
There are 250 numbered sets, first come, first served. There will be no reprint of this edition.
Payment via the buy button below.
A set with UK P&P is £13.99
A set with the unavoidably pricey International Airmail P&P is £18.99
Editor’s Note
A word of explanation. In 2018, inspired by the earlier ‘literary sleuthing’ of Charles E. Robinson, I published a 100-copy edition of ‘The Ghost of the Private Theatricals’, which I attributed, in a lengthy explanatory Afterword, to Mary Shelley. It quickly sold out. Though it was advertised as ‘never to be reprinted’, the howls of despair I have repeatedly received from people desperate to buy a copy in the years since have caused me to reconsider on this one (and only) occasion. To those lucky few who do own a copy of the ‘original’ 100-copy edition, fear not, the exclusivity and collectability of that edition remains: those copies include an actual hand-printed linocut tipped in as the frontispiece; this ‘new edition’ (which is marked as such) does not, though it does include a brief new Postscript to the Afterword, dealing with the 2018 edition’s coverage in the Times Literary Supplement.
This new release is paired with a chapbook featuring ‘Gibbet Hill’ by Bram Stoker. To be clear, I played no part in the exciting rediscovery of this wonderfully atmospheric tale: the credit for that goes to Brian Cleary. He contributed to an excellent edition of ‘Gibbet Hill’, well worth your attention, which can be purchased here. What that edition does not include, perhaps surprisingly, is a reproduction of the original Turner print which directly inspired (and indeed is mentioned in) the story. This is included in this set. When I realised there was also a print by Turner of Castle Heidelberg, visited by Mary Shelley during her Rambles in Germany and Italy, and therefore a possible inspiration for Schloss Trubenstern in the ‘The Ghost of the Private Theatricals’, I thought a pair of chapbooks and a pair of prints could be the way to go. When I then realised that April 2025 is the 250th anniversary of Turner’s birth, the decision was made!
Thanks as always to Martin Stiff at Amazing15.com for his design, which plays such an important part of the chapbooks I publish. Thanks also to Sharon Newell (aka Sharon Gosling) for her original frontispiece for the Shelley chapbook.
For the avoidance of doubt, the text to ‘Gibbet Hill’ has been edited slightly for clarity and obvious typos by me, directly from scans of its original newspaper appearance.
And no, I do not plan any reprints of any of my other sold-out chapbooks, so please don't ask!
