Collections of an Only Child: Seventy Years a Bibliophile, the Library of Justin G. Schiller

A Significant Collection of Eight Letters Covering 15-Years of Friendship Between Carroll and the Mother of One of His Child-Friends

Guildford, Christ Church, and Eastbourne, April 22, 1878-June 15, 1893. Group of eight autograph letters (together 29 pages), signed (one initialed) by Lewis Carroll to Sarah Elizabeth Blakemore, and her daughter, Edith Rose "Dolly" Blakemore. The majority in Carroll's customary purple ink (two in dark ink); includes three mounted addressed envelopes in Carroll's hand. Tipped into seven red cloth-covered board volumes (8vo); gift inscriptions on front blanks in same, dated 1969 (three beneath mounted envelopes).

A significant collection of eight autograph letters from Lewis Carroll to Sarah Elizabeth Blakemore, the mother of Edith Rose "Dolly” Blakemore (1872-1947)--one of Carroll's child-friends whose relationship lasted into adulthood.

Carroll first met five-year-old Edith Blakemore during his annual holiday in Eastbourne, East Sussex, in August 1877. The daughter of Sarah and Villiers Blakemore, a Birmingham merchant and publisher, Edith and her family summered at the seaside resort town, where Carroll met them near the beach. Carroll was immediately taken by the child, and wrote in his journal that very same evening, "I have made friends with quite the brightest child, and nearly the prettiest...She seemed to be on springs, and was dancing incessantly to the music...her eyes literally glitter...the mother (was) quiet and pleasant...Dolly is fascinating, I hope to see her again." (Cohen, The Letters of Lewis Carroll, 1979, Vol. I, p. 281 n. 2). Of the nearly 200 child-friends that Carroll had known throughout his life, he held Edith in the highest esteem, writing in an 1890 letter (not included), that she was "rather the exception among the hundred or so child-friends who have brightened my life." She would later pass her Oxford and Cambridge Higher Certificate, and became known as an amateur actress (see Cohen, Letters, Vol. I, pp. 280-281).

These eight letters total nearly 30 pages in length and cover a variety of topics, from Carroll's thoughts on friendship, the recently invented electric pen, advice on entering university, and his opinions on theater, but generally center on his relationship and fondness for Edith. The first dates to 1878--less than a year after their first meeting--and the final, 15 years later, in 1893--less than five years before his death. Exuding Carroll's characteristic humor and wit, they are notable for their conviviality and almost endless patience toward Mrs. Blakemore, especially as seen in the final two letters where Carroll defends his actions regarding a re-gifted holiday card and his conduct while chaperoning Edith. As such, they provide a unique window, rarely seen to market in such length, both into Carroll's relationship toward the parents of one of his child-friends, as well as into his relationships with children more generally. The latter is most notably exhibited in Carroll's March 31, 1890 letter (No. 5 below), written to then 18-year old Edith, where he confesses "I do sympathise so heartily with you in what you say about feeling shy with children, when you have to entertain them! Sometimes they are a real terror to me--specially boys; little girls I can now & then get on with, when they're few enough. They easily become 'de Trop' But with little boys I'm out of my element altogether..."

Comprising:

1. The Chestnuts, Guildford, April 22, 1878. One sheet folded to make four-pages, 6 x 3 3/4 in. (152 x 95 mm). Two-page autograph letter, signed by Carroll in purple ink, to Mrs. Blakemore, regarding her daughter, Edith: "..."I shall not find it easy to forget your little 'Dolly', I think!...Some day when she can write I shall like to have a note from her, and shall prize it more than any number of little presents. Sincerely hoping that tears & her eyes are strangers now..."

2. No place, no date. One sheet folded to make four-pages, 7 1/8 x 4 1/2 in. (181 x 114 mm). Three-page autograph letter, signed by Carroll in purple ink to Mrs. Blakemore: "...I hope I shall be patient enough to think kindly of Dolly, even if she never speaks to me again--& to remember her as she was the first time I saw her, before she had been teased into an unnatural state of mind--It has occurred to me that perhaps Mr. Blakemore has never seen the 'electric' pen, a new invention...I should be most happy to show him..."

3. Christ Church, Oxford, March 5, 1880. One sheet folded to make four-pages, 5 3/8 x 3 1/2 in. (136 x 89 mm). Four-page autograph letter, signed by Carroll in purple ink to Mrs. Blakemore: "I have had it on my mind for about 4 months, to write to you in answer to your letter about Pilgrim's Progress, to say how entirely I agree in the general principle of not mixing sacred things with comic..." Carroll continues by providing a review of the production and his thoughts on theater.

4. Eastbourne, September 6, 1883. One sheet folded to make four-pages, 6 x 4 in. (152 x 102 mm). Four-page autograph letter, signed by Carroll in purple ink to Mrs. Blakemore giving advice, presumably for one of her children, on entering university: "...I quite agree with you that a good education is most desirable in all lines of the law...The way to get his name put down for admission is simply to write to the head of the place. As to preparing for matriculation, you seem to have only 3 possible courses--to keep him at school, to send him to a tutor, to let him work at home...Young men sometimes prepare, in Oxford itself, for entering...", etc.

5. Christ Church, Oxford, March 31, 1890. One sheet folded to make four-pages, 5 3/8 x 3 1/2 in. (136 x 89 mm). Four-page autograph letter in purple ink, initialed by Carroll, likely to Edith Blakemore: "Oh, you naughty little girl! What business have you to be jealous of your old school-fellows, because I'm going to send them little bits of Charades & things, & because I had the effrontery to send them my 'affectionate regards'?...But seriously dear Child, I do sympathise so heartily with you in what you say about feeling shy with children, when you have to entertain them! Sometimes they are a real terror to me--specially boys; little girls I can now & then get on with, when they're few enough. They easily become 'de Prop' But with little boys I'm out of my element altogether--I sent the 'Nursey'...to an Oxford friend...he added 'I think I must bring my little boy to see you' So I wrote to say 'don't'...he could hardly believe his eyes...he thought I doted on all children. But I'm not 'omnivorous'--like a pig. I pick & choose..."

6. Christ Church, Oxford, October 28, 1890. One sheet folded to make four-pages, 5 1/2 x 3 1/2 in. (140 x 89 mm). Three-page autograph letter, signed by Carroll in purple ink, to Mrs. Blakemore: "I thank you very heartily for your most kind & hospitable letter, & gladly accept your offer to house me when I come to give the address at the High School...I shall be sorry to miss Edith's bright face, but I hope you won't find me an entirely discontented guest on that account..." With a post-script by Carroll, "P.S. I fear I've no tastes for sight-seeing!"

7. Christ Church, Oxford, July 5, 1891. Two sheets folded to make eight-pages, each 5 1/2 x 3 1/2 in. (140 x 89 mm). Six-page autograph letter, signed by Carroll to Mrs. Blakemore, explaining his behavior in regards to a recent visit by Edith: "I am glad you have got your daughter safe home again, however tired & wet! Even a tired and wet Edith is better (if a bachelor may be allowed to speculate on such difficult problems) than no Edith at all. And I am also very glad to be able to tell you that the misfortune, and the 'failure', which you lament, are creatures of the imagination!...So please put away such ideal sorrows (unless you can turn them to such good account as Tennyson's 'Margaret', to whom he writes 'Your sorrow, only sorrow's shade, keeps real sorrow far away!'), & believe that Edith's visit was, so far as I am concerned, neither a mistake nor a failure..."

8. Christ Church, Oxford, June 15, 1893. One sheet folded to make four-pages, 7 1/8 x 4 1/2 in. (181 x 114 mm). Three-page autograph letter, signed by Carroll in grey ink, to Mrs. Blakemore, attempting to smooth over a disturbance in their friendship: "I have just read over again, in order to answer it, your last letter...I would not answer it at once, but let Time (the great soother of all the roughness of life) help to erase the annoyance I fear I have caused you by mentioning I had handed on, for the benefit of hospital-children, a Xmas card which you say was painted by a niece of yours...I think friendship is a matter of one's feelings, not of one's outer life, & I trust it does not really depend on such external aids..."