CATALOGUE
Works
The Mint, 1928 text
Military Report on the Sinai Peninsula
Translation
The Forest Giant
Letters
T. E. Lawrence Letters series
Correspondence with Bernard and Charlotte Shaw
Correspondence with E. M. Forster and F.L. Lucas
Correspondence with Henry Williamson
26 November 2010
T. E. Lawrence
'The Mint' and Later Writings About Service Life
Castle Hill Press, 2010
Library Edition, 475 numbered copies
Edited by Jeremy and Nicole Wilson
Introduction by Jeremy Wilson
ABOUT THIS BOOK
The Mint and Later Writings About Service Life is the latest volume in the scholarly Castle Hill Press edition of Lawrence's works and letters. It contains the 1928 text of The Mint, together with a selection of Lawrence's later writings about his life in the ranks. These are drawn from letters and reports and presented in diary form.
The narrative of Lawrence's RAF years therefore begins in 1922 and ends with his retirement in February1935. He himself thought of expanding The Mint in this way. The result is a far more interesting version of Lawrence's second book than any edition available until now.
This Library Edition has been designed as a companion to the 2003 Library Edition of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, The Complete 1922 Text. The three bindings complement the Seven Pillars bindings, as illustrated below.
An important consequence of the additional material (which nearly doubles the length of the book) is that Lawrence's gruelling account of the recruits' initial training is balanced by his later sense of security and fulfilment, especially during the years he spent helping to develop high-speed motorboats for the RAF.
Above: The Mint and Later Writings About Service Life shown, left to right, in its three bindings: quarter-goatskin, full-goatskin and cloth. In each case the equivalent binding of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, The Complete 1922 Text (2003) is shown beside it.
List of contents
- Introduction by Jeremy Wilson (pp. ix-xviii)
- The Mint (pp. 1-149): The text of the manuscript of The Mint presented by Lawrence to Edward Garnett in 1928. In Lawrence's last years, when many people had read and commented on The Mint, he revised it in detail. The 1928 text, like our 1922 text of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, shows the text of The Mint before this process. We have made only light copy-editing corrections.
- 'Later Writings About Service Life' (pp. 151-264): A selection from Lawrence's later writings about his life in ranks of the RAF, taken from letters and documents he wrote between 1927 and 1935. These are similar to the sources he himself used to write the Cranwell section of The Mint, for which he had few notes. In effect, this fourth section extends The Mint to the end of Lawrence's RAF service.
- Acknowledgements and Sources (p. 265)
- References for the extracts published in 'Later Writings About Service Life' (pp.266-70)
- [Supplement to the full-goatskin copies only]: 'Letters About The Mint' - discussion of The Mint in letters written by Lawrence between 1927 and 1935.
SPECIFICATION
288 pages
Trimmed page size 234 x 156mm
Typeset by Castle Hill Press in 11 point Caslon
Printed on acid-free paper
ISBN: 9781873141601
250 numbered copies in a sewn hardback binding by The Fine Book Bindery: blue cloth; top edge stained; ribbon place-marker; letterpress-printed endpapers, head and tail bands; glassine dust-jacket.
Above: full cloth (right) with the equivalent binding of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, The Complete 1922 Text (2003)
ISBN: 9781873141595
180 numbered copies bound by The Fine Book Bindery in quarter black Nigerian goatskin with blue cloth sides. Top edge gilt, letterpress-printed endpapers, ribbon place marker, head and tail bands. Coloured frontispiece. Issued post-publication in a blue cloth-covered slipcase.
Above: quarter goatskin (right) with the equivalent binding of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, The Complete 1922 Text (2003)
ISBN: 9781873141588
45 numbered copies bound by The Fine Book Bindery in full black Nigerian goatskin. All edges gilt, ribbon place marker, head and tail bands, letterpress-printed endpapers, coloured frontispiece.
Issued in a blue cloth-covered slipcase, which also contains a booklet containing a selection of Lawrence's comments about The Mint, from the appendix to the large-format edition.
Note
The first Castle Hill Press printing of The Mint and Later Writings About Service Life was a Large Paper edition.
For this Library Edition we re-set most of the text to fit in fewer pages, using the same smaller format as the Library Edition of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, The Complete 1922 Text.
Related page
NEWS
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For progress reports on our current projects, please check our News page.
For more general comments about our projects, publishing, and T.E. Lawrence see Jeremy Wilson's blog.
Customer feedback
Some comments from the customer feedback page on our old website:
. . . I couldn't be more pleased. The attention to detail, and conception of this edition, are wonderful . . .
I cannot praise too highly the quality of the production, with exceptional clarity and beauty of print, the erudition of editing, and the excellent on-line service. Important correspondence in beautiful books - the perfect combination.
. . .Excellence in research and editing, and magnificently produced books in superb bindings. Last but not least, efficient and friendly service, with books posted in rock solid packaging.
. . . These books are a pleasure to own and read . . .
. . . a quite invaluable job in publishing (very beautifully . . .) many of the writings of TEL which hitherto have been available only in manuscript form in museums, libraries or private collections, or in out-of-print books which are very hard to obtain.An excellent set of publications that are beautifully edited and produced. A wonderful addition to my library and to any library.