Is My The Way We Live Now a First Edition?

The points of issue

• The true first edition is the issue in twenty monthly parts, Chapman and Hall, London, February 1874 – September 1875, catalogued as "first edition in the original monthly parts" by Bonhams, Christie's and Forum Auctions and collated at Sadleir 44
• Points: octavo parts in the original blue printed pictorial wrappers, the front wrapper designed around a globe on which Father Time sits dejectedly amid scenes from the financier Melmotte's career; forty wood-engraved plates after Lionel G. Fawkes, signed "LF" — Sadleir originally mis-attributed these to Luke Fildes and later corrected the attribution, and the Fildes error is still repeated in the trade; and the inserted advertisements, which must collate as Sadleir sets out and include the separately titled "The Way We Live Now Advertiser"
• In a parts book it is the advertisements, not the text, that decide a genuine set
• The first edition in book form is the two-volume large octavo, Chapman and Hall, London, June 1875, reported in bright green cloth decorated in black and gilt; its sheets are the unsold sheets of the parts printing, so the book text is not a resetting or a reprinting
• Neither format carries a printing statement or number line

How Chapman and Hall marked a first edition

• No edition statement on early firsts: identify by title-page date, absence of later-printing wording, and (for serialized novels) by the original part-issue versus the bound volume.
• For Dickens part-issues (Pickwick, Nicholas Nickleby, Martin Chuzzlewit, Our Mutual Friend, Edwin Drood), correct plates/etchings, advertisement slips, and wrapper states are the diagnostic points; Pickwick is the classi…

Full Chapman and Hall first-edition guide →

How to verify your copy, step by step

1. Find the copyright page — the verso (back) of the title page.
2. Confirm the first-edition statement — look for “First Edition,” “First Printing,” or the publisher’s equivalent wording.
3. Read the number line — the lowest number is the printing. A line including 1 is a first printing (Random House deliberately ends at 2). Paste it into the decoder.
4. Verify this is the American true first — not a later-market or reprint edition.
5. Rule out a book-club edition — a blind-stamp on the rear board or a jacket with no printed price marks a book-club copy.
6. Photograph four things — the front cover, spine, title page, and copyright page — the standard record for identification.

The dust jacket

For a collectible first edition the dust jacket matters as much as the book. Confirm the jacket is present and unclipped — the printed price should still be at the corner of the flap (a clipped corner or a price-less flap can indicate a book-club issue). First-state jackets can differ from later ones in the cover art, blurbs, or review quotations; where a specific first-state jacket point is known for this title it is noted above.

Binding & format

Where multiple bindings exist, the hardcover trade issue is usually (but not always) the precedence copy — confirm against the points above. Later printings often show cheaper cloth, thinner boards, or simplified spine stamping. A simultaneous signed or limited issue, when one exists, is a distinct state from the trade first.

Is this the true first?

The census claim of "Chapman & Hall 1875" names only the book form and understates the case. The twenty monthly parts (Chapman and Hall, February 1874 – September 1875) precede and are the first edition; the two-volume book followed in June 1875 — released ahead of the serial's own conclusion because the parts were selling badly. Both are collected, the parts being the senior and far scarcer object; the Trollope Society's chronology independently records the parts as February 1874 – September 1875 with book publication in June 1875. A Harper & Brothers (New York) first American edition also appeared in 1875, in publisher's green cloth with gilt spine titling, illustrated after Fawkes, of 408 pp. plus publisher's advertisements; it is a US reprint and does not compete with the London parts for precedence.

Telling it from reprints & book-club editions

No book-club issue is possible for an 1875 Trollope; the tells are remainder and reprint issues. Roughly eight months after book publication Chatto & Windus bought up the remaining Chapman and Hall sheets and issued them under a Chatto & Windus title page and binding — the same printed sheets, but not the first edition, and the substituted title page is the tell. Chapman and Hall separately offered the two volumes bound as one in the same green cloth, sold notably at railway stalls; this is a publisher's alternative binding of the original sheets rather than a remainder, and both original title pages are reported present in it. The Tauchnitz (Leipzig) 1875 issue is a continental reprint. Any copy with a Chatto & Windus title page, and any later one-volume Chapman and Hall reprint, is a "first thus" at best.

Frequently asked questions

Is my copy of The Way We Live Now a first edition?

A first edition of The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope (Chapman and Hall) is identified by: The true first edition is the issue in twenty monthly parts, Chapman and Hall, London, February 1874 – September 1875, catalogued as "first edition in the original monthly parts" by Bonhams, Christie's and Forum Auctions and collated at Sadleir 44.

How do I tell the first printing from a later one?

Check the copyright page. A number line whose lowest number is 1 marks a first printing (Random House ends at 2). The census claim of "Chapman & Hall 1875" names only the book form and understates the case.

Is the book-club edition the same as the first?

No book-club issue is possible for an 1875 Trollope; the tells are remainder and reprint issues. Roughly eight months after book publication Chatto & Windus bought up the remaining Chapman and Hall sheets and issued them under a Chatto & Windus title page and binding — the same printed sheets, but not the first edition, and the substituted title page is the tell. Chapman and Hall separately offered the two volumes bound as one in the same green cloth, sold notably at railway stalls; this is a pu

I have a first edition of The Way We Live Now — what should I do?

First, document the copy: photograph the copyright page (the number line and any edition statement) and the dust-jacket flap — an unclipped, priced jacket matters. Confirm the points of issue above against your copy, and use the free First Edition Checker to decode the printing. To sell, the author’s collecting guide covers the market. And if you are clearing books in the Albuquerque area, the New Mexico Literacy Project offers free pickup, any condition, and makes sure collectible copies are identified rather than discarded.

Glossary

First edition

Every copy printed from the first setting of type. Collectors usually want the first edition, first printing (the true first).

First printing / impression

A single press run from that setting. The first printing is the earliest and most desirable; later printings are still the first edition but not the true first.

Number line (printer's key)

A row of numbers on the copyright page (e.g. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1). The lowest number present is the printing — a line including 1 marks a first printing (Random House deliberately ends at 2).

Points of issue

Specific physical details — a stated edition, a number line, a typo, a jacket state — that identify the true first printing.

Book-club edition (BCE)

A reprint made for a book club. Tells include a blind-stamped dot or square on the rear board and a dust jacket with no printed price. Not the true first.

First thus

The first appearance of a particular version (first paperback, first illustrated, first U.S. printing) — a first of that kind, not the first edition of the work.