FIRSTS ONLINE Winter 2020

18. [WALLACE, Edgar]
Papers and Correspondence Concerning the Publication
by J.W. Arrowsmith of Angel Esquire (1908) and The
Melody of Death (1915)
V.p.: J.W. Arrowsmith and others, 1925-1959
A small quantity of contracts, correspondence and related materials, housed
in a manila folder. Some inevitable edgewear and age-toning, but a well
preserved collection.
A DETAILED PUBLISHER’S ARCHIVE CONCERNING THE
PUBLICATION OF TWO NOVELS BY EDGAR WALLACE:
ANGEL ESQUIRE (1908) AND THE MELODY OF DEATH
(1915), INCLUDING ORIGINAL CONTRACTS SIGNED BY THE
AUTHOR.
Edgar Wallace [1874-1932] was a soldier, journalist and early sports
commentator before embarking on his prolific career as a writer of
detective stories. Leaving editing to others and dictating the text on to
wax cylinders, Wallace ‘wrote’ at high speed, often producing a new book
in just a few days. His first work was The Four Just Men, self-published in
1905; one of his last was King Kong, one of several scripts he wrote for
RKO, this one completed just weeks before his death in 1932.
over serialisation rights to The Melody of Death. Drawn up by solicitors
Stanley Attenborough & Co. of London, acting for J.W.Arrowsmith, and
with the relevant correspondence between the two parties;
v) Memoranda of Agreement and associated correspondence between
J.W.Arrowsmith and others, ascribing foreign-language rights to the
two books to publishers in Germany, Czechoslovakia and Poland (late
1920s), and Spanish and Argentinian rights for The Melody of Death
(early 1940s);
vi) Memoranda of Agreement between J.W.Arrowsmith and The
Readers’ Library,13 September and 2 October 1928, for cheap edition
andFrench-language publishing rights to the two books, with associated
correspondence;
vii) Short correspondence between the royalties departments at
J.M.Dent and A.P.Watt, March 1959, confirming reversion of rights
to the two books to the Edgar Wallace estate on the twenty-fifth
anniversary of the author’s death (10 February 1957).
£1,250 (plus 20% VAT to EU purchasers)
J.W. Arrowsmith began life in the nineteenth century as a printer and
publisher based in Bristol. (It was Arrowsmith who published the first
edition of Jerome K. Jerome’s Three Men In A Boat in 1889.) When the
imprint restructured in the early twentieth century and the publishing
arm of the business set up in London, existing contracts with authors had
to be redrafted and reaffirmed. The earliest documents in this collection
re-render copyright of the two books to Arrowsmith, and supersede
documents first drawn up in 1908 and 1914 respectively, when the books
were first published.
This collection of papers includes:
i) Two Memoranda of Agreement between Wallace and publisher
J.W.Arrowsmith, 3 April 1925, under which Wallace re-renders
copyright of the two books to J.W.Arrowsmith. BOTH DOCUMENTS
SIGNED BY WALLACE;
ii) Two Memoranda of Agreement between J.W.Arrowsmith and Small
Maynard & Co. of Boston, 3 September and 5 October 1926, assigning
US publishing rights to the two books. With a carbon of a TL from
J.W.Arrowsmith to the Recorder in Bankruptcy, 9 March 1927, giving
notification of Small Maynard’s recent bankruptcy;
iii) Two Memoranda of Agreement between J.W.Arrowsmith and the
Dial Press, New York, undated but 1927, assigning US publishing rights
to the two books. Initialled and with occasional holograph amendments;
iv) Memorandum of Agreement between J.W.Arrowsmith and
Wallace, undated but 1928, giving clarification of the documents in (i),
necessitated by a dispute having arisen between publisher and author
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