GOUDGE, Elizabeth (author). C. Walter HODGES (illustrator). The Little White Horse. London, University of London Press Ltd. 1946.
8vo. Original light blue cloth gilt, pictorial map and plan endpapers in light blue (different at front and rear), in pictorial dustwrapper; pp. [iv], v-vi + 286; illustrated with 4 coloured plates and wonderful black and white images throughout printed as full-page plates and chapter-headings; externally very fresh and clean with a tiny bruise to lower forecorner of upper cover and the usual slight shadowing to spine, through the jacket, internally fine, crisp and uninscribed, presented in the scarce price-clipped dustwrapper with toning to spine, nicking to spine ends, and an associated 12mm closed tear to tail, now expertly repaired to the reverse with archival tissue-tape.
First edition. A twentieth-century children's classic, beloved by many; which is often cited among the finest juvenile novels of the last century. The fantasy is set in 1842 and tells the tale of an orphaned teenage girl who is sent to stay with her guardian in the West Country. The estate is imbued in magic and mystery and the little white horse is a unicorn. In its year of publication it won the Carnegie Medal, which recognised the best children's book by a British subject. It has been adapted both to film and to television.
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