Sketches of Young Couples

[c. 1840]

de Beer Eb 1840 D

London: Chapman and Hall

This later printing of Charles Dickens’s Sketches of Young Couples [c.1840] not only reveals a classic example of recycling, but reveals an interesting association with a later publication and publishers Chapman and Hall and Routledge. A very thin marbled paper cover wraps around a barely distinguishable orange cover that advertises a shilling edition of Herman Melville’s Omoo, published by Routledge. There is no ready answer on how the decorated board covers arrived at Chapman and Hall, but what is certain is that it is a shoddy production. The covers of what may be the remains of Routledge’s pirated edition of Omoo (1850) have been bound upside down and the paste holding the paper covers has long lost its adhesiveness.