COBURN, Alvin Langdon (1882-1966). London. London: Duckworth & Co. and New York: Brentano's, 1909. 2° (411 x 308mm). 20 hand-pulled gravures mounted on heavy grey paper. (List of plates and all plates neatly repaired in the inside margin.) Original green leather-backed drab paper-covered boards, front cover lettered in gilt, original grey dust-jacket printed in dark blue (binding chipped at the foot and with light wear, dust-jacket worn at extremities and with some tears, these and front panel repaired with paper tape on the verso).

COBURN, Alvin Langdon (1882-1966). London. London: Duckworth & Co. and New York: Brentano's, 1909. 2° (411 x 308mm). 20 hand-pulled gravures mounted on heavy grey paper. (List of plates and all plates neatly repaired in the inside margin.) Original green leather-backed drab paper-covered boards, front cover lettered in gilt, original grey dust-jacket printed in dark blue (binding chipped at the foot and with light wear, dust-jacket worn at extremities and with some tears, these and front panel repaired with paper tape on the verso).

FIRST EDITION OF COBURN'S FIRST BOOK, IN THE VERY RARE DUST-JACKET. Coburn made all of the gravures for this book, etching and steel-facing all the plates, pulling proofs and supervising the entire print run. 'In my hands photogravure produced results which can be considered as "original prints", and which I would not hesitate to sign' (An Autobiography, pp. 74-75). London exemplifies 'a shift in attitude that triggered the final push towards photographic modernism' (The Photobook). George Bernard Shaw called Coburn 'the greatest photographer in the world'. 101 Books, pp.38-9; The Open Book, pp.50-1; Regards à travers le livre 6; cf. The Photobook, vol. I, p.74.