Seven Pillars of Wisdom, A Triumph (1935, first trade edition)

First trade printing of T E Lawrence's account of his role as a military advisor during the Arab Revolt in the Great War

Author

Publisher

Printing Details

First trade edition, first printing. Hardback in dustwrapper. Bound in the original brown buckram with gilt titling to spine, and gilt design to upper board. Fore-edge untrimmed. 26 × 20cm, 672pp. Illustrated with maps and portraits.

'The story I have to tell,' wrote T. E. Lawrence, 'is one of the most splendid ever given for the telling.' It is no over-statement: the tale of a stranger from a far-off world who arrives among an oppressed people, adopts their ways as if born to them, and helps to lead them to freedom against terrible odds, is the stuff of legend. And legend Lawrence became.

In 1918 Lawrence rode into Damascus at the head of a victorious Arab army. Though his active service had lasted only two years—from 1916—in that brief period he rescued the Arab Revolt from oblivion, formulated modern guerilla warfare almost single-handedly and helped the Arabs to defeat Ottoman overlords who had dominated them for four hundred years. His account of that desert campaign is every bit as gripping as the legend suggests: with his small band of Bedouin, he organised raiding parties to attack the Hejaz railway, laid mines, led camel charges and melted back into the desert where the Turks could not follow. T. E. Lawrence's most famous triumph, the capture of the port of Akaba, ranks among the most brilliant operations in British military history.

Condition

The book itself is in very good condition, with intermittent light spotted foxing, and tanning / foxing to the untrimmed page edges. The inner binding secure and the book free from inscription. The dustwrapper is good, with comprehensive foxing to the front panel, some creasing and loss to the corners and spine top, and a slight residue of tape repair to the fore-edge of the front. However, it has not been price-clipped and is now within a protective sleeve. Overall, a very solid copy with all plates present.