COLLINS, Wilkie (1824-1889). The Moonstone. A Romance. London: [Savill, Edwards, and Co. for] Tinsley Brothers, 1868.
3 volumes, 8vo (191 x 121 mm). Half-titles; lacking ads. Full modern polished calf gilt, spines in 6 compartments with raised bands, crimson and teal morocco lettering-pieces gilt in 3, others completely gilt, top edges gilt, gilt dentelles, stamp-signed by Brentano’s; original purple cloth bound in at end of each volume.
FIRST EDITION of a landmark in the development of the detective novel that was inspired by the case of Constance Kent, who murdered her younger brother in 1860. The work was also inspired by Collins’ own addiction to alcohol and opium. In the story, Franklin Blake was secretly given laudanum (a potent combination of opium and alcohol) by Dr. Candy who wanted to exact vengeance on Franklin for criticizing medicine which caused him to steal his cousin’s diamond (“The Moonstone”) in a narcotic trance.
“In The Moonstone, Collins illuminates the social stigma surrounding drug addiction and the effects that the negative connotation had on opium habituates. Predating the disease model of addiction, the connotation suggests that those who succumb to drug addiction are morally fallible rather than ill. The stigma influences the addicts of Collins’s novel as they struggle to keep their dependency private. Ultimately, Collins reveals the necessity of opium. Without another form of pain relief, his characters must indulge in an addictive substance” (Grass, Morality and Medicine: Opium and Addiction in Wilkie Collins’s Armadale and The Moonstone). Catalogue of Crime 576; Parrish, p. 89; Sadleir 598; Wolff 1368. A Haycraft-Queen Cornerstone and a Horowitz high spot.