John Blackwood to GHL, Edinburgh, 11 May 1876
Title
John Blackwood to GHL, Edinburgh, 11 May 1876
Title
John Blackwood to GHL, Edinburgh, 11 May 1876
Sender
John Blackwood
Recipient
George Henry Lewes
Date(s)
- 1876-05-11
Place
Edinburgh
Letter Content
John Blackwood to GHL, Edinburgh, 11 May 1876
MS: National Library of Scotland. Extract published: John Blackwood, p. 396.
George Street, | Edinburgh.
May 11/76.
My Dear Lewes
I shall be glad to oblige Messrs. Harper by letting them have proofs of Deronda sooner, although neither from their explanation nor my own knowledge of printing can I understand what convenience it can be to have the proofs more than a month or at most two before hand. The point to be strictly stipulated is no publication before the appearance of the book in this country. Any such forestalling would be a very serious thing.
I inclose a most pleasant statistical table of the sales of Daniel up to the present time. The closeness with which the sale of the successive numbers keeps up to the sale of the first Book indicates most satisfactorily how firm and enduring is the hold that the work is taking. I never recollect a case in which the sale of a work published in a serial form kept so closely up to the first start. Many buy a first part of a popular work from curiosity and then drop it, contenting themselves to read afterwards as opportunity may serve, but Deronda has evidently hooked his fish at the first start and is keeping him steadily on the line all through the run. You will have observed too from the tables sent to you at different times what a steady back sale there has been.
I knew that book IV must tell tremendously. Jews are not generally popular pictures in fiction, but then look how they are served up. They never have been so presented before like human beings with their good and their evil, their comic and their tragic side. In the midst of triumph it is distressing to hear of Mrs. Lewes feeling so feeble. I do hope the expedition to Oxford will do her good. I am looking forward with great pleasure to seeing you both next week, as I am going up to London on Monday but I have to go out of town on Tuesday so that it will be Wednesday or Thursday before I can come to you. A letter written tomorrow or Saturday will still find me here. My wife and daughter are not going with me this time so I am going into bachelor quarters at 14 Arlington St. where the old waiter Henry who took entire charge of me at the Burlington for some 15 years has got a lodging house. 473 I had not been well at all, suffering from that confounded thing called the mucous membrane, but a week at Strathtyrum has put me all right again. Hoping soon to see you both well and flourishing
ever yours truly
John Blackwood.
I am puzzling greatly as to how Mrs. Lewes is to wind up in one more book and I am certain the public after reading book 7 will sympathise with me in wishing that there were to be more. Indeed I see symptoms already that the public would gladly have it prolonged to any length she wished.
MS: National Library of Scotland. Extract published: John Blackwood, p. 396.
George Street, | Edinburgh.
May 11/76.
My Dear Lewes
I shall be glad to oblige Messrs. Harper by letting them have proofs of Deronda sooner, although neither from their explanation nor my own knowledge of printing can I understand what convenience it can be to have the proofs more than a month or at most two before hand. The point to be strictly stipulated is no publication before the appearance of the book in this country. Any such forestalling would be a very serious thing.
I inclose a most pleasant statistical table of the sales of Daniel up to the present time. The closeness with which the sale of the successive numbers keeps up to the sale of the first Book indicates most satisfactorily how firm and enduring is the hold that the work is taking. I never recollect a case in which the sale of a work published in a serial form kept so closely up to the first start. Many buy a first part of a popular work from curiosity and then drop it, contenting themselves to read afterwards as opportunity may serve, but Deronda has evidently hooked his fish at the first start and is keeping him steadily on the line all through the run. You will have observed too from the tables sent to you at different times what a steady back sale there has been.
I knew that book IV must tell tremendously. Jews are not generally popular pictures in fiction, but then look how they are served up. They never have been so presented before like human beings with their good and their evil, their comic and their tragic side. In the midst of triumph it is distressing to hear of Mrs. Lewes feeling so feeble. I do hope the expedition to Oxford will do her good. I am looking forward with great pleasure to seeing you both next week, as I am going up to London on Monday but I have to go out of town on Tuesday so that it will be Wednesday or Thursday before I can come to you. A letter written tomorrow or Saturday will still find me here. My wife and daughter are not going with me this time so I am going into bachelor quarters at 14 Arlington St. where the old waiter Henry who took entire charge of me at the Burlington for some 15 years has got a lodging house. 473 I had not been well at all, suffering from that confounded thing called the mucous membrane, but a week at Strathtyrum has put me all right again. Hoping soon to see you both well and flourishing
ever yours truly
John Blackwood.
I am puzzling greatly as to how Mrs. Lewes is to wind up in one more book and I am certain the public after reading book 7 will sympathise with me in wishing that there were to be more. Indeed I see symptoms already that the public would gladly have it prolonged to any length she wished.
Signature
John Blackwood.
Citation
John Blackwood, John Blackwood to GHL, Edinburgh, 11 May 1876, Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://www.georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/95357