WCP5062

Letter (cc) (WCP5062.5536)

[1]1

26th March [1]900

Dear Sir,

We are sending you herewith the 'Wonderful Century Reader'2 arranged in chapters by Mr. Williams3 with suggestions for the illustrations. Mr. Williams thinks that some of the longer chapters might with advantage be condensed but he hesitates to interfere with your text — also that some few of the shorter chapters might be amplified.

He has asked us to submit the M.S. to you in the hope that you will be able to finally settle the text — [2]4 He proposes that we should then have the text set in slip form and that we should re-submit it to you with the cuts5 which we are able to procure for your approval — Of course any suggestions you may offer as to suitable cuts will be very welcome as we are anxious to have only such as suit the text and are good of their kind[.]

We are, dear Sir, | Yours faithfully | [no signature]

D[octo]r. Alfred Russel Wallace

1
The letter bears no heading or signature but originates from ARW’s London publisher Swan Sonnenschein & Co., founded in 1878 by William Swan Sonnenschein (1855-1931).
2
Wallace A. R. (1901). The Wonderful Century Reader London, Swan Sonnenschein & Co., published in November 1901. This was an abridged version of the 4th Edition (February 1901) of The Wonderful Century; Its Successes and Its Failures, first published in 1898.
3
Not positively identified. He is probably Francis Williams (full name given in WCP5058), the Board School editor, referred to in WCP5054 (31 October 1899), in which Swan Sonnenschein & Co. first broach the possibility to ARW of producing the Supplementary Board School Reader. In WCP5056, Mr. Williams is mentioned by name as having "a very exact knowledge of the School Board requirements and the tendencies of the teachers.".
4
The page is stamped "500".
5
The engraved boxwood block or woodcut dominated early Victorian book illustration. Electrotyping later replaced woodcuts for the production of fine artwork in books. In the second half of the century, most woodblock engravings were actually printed from electrotypes.

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Letter (cc) (WCP5062.5536)]

For more information about the transcriptions and metadata, see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon

Revision history

Transcribed by O'Dell, Sandra [2018-08-15]

Please cite as “WCP5062,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 29 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP5062