Benham, William, 1831-1910.
Gore-Booth, Eva, 1870-1926, former owner.

"Readings from the 'Imitation of Christ, ' arranged for each Sunday of the Christian year": pages [21]-26.

"Printing office of the publisher"--Colophon.

LO 12865 is Eva Gore-Booth's annotated copy of The Imitation of Christ and includes a photograph pasted in to the front endpapers.

Insertions available. See [Miscellaneous insertions removed from the LO Collection] in the NLI catalogue.

Eva Gore-Booth's copy of The Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis, translated by W. Benham, Tauchnitz, Leipzig., 1877, small 8vo. Bound without all the preliminary material - see Todd and Bowden, 1680. Probably early 20th century full vellum with leather ties, calligraphic lettering in black on spine, patterned endpapers. With 'Eva Firenze 1920' written in pencil on the first free blank. Also with seven quotations in her pencil manuscript on the preliminary blank leaves and a further prose piece and jottings in a much weaker hand (but also probably Gore-Booth's) on the last blank leaf. A few light marginal pencil marks. Eva Gore-Booth, the Irish poet and dramatist, suffragist and social worker, sister of the revolutionary Countess Markievicz, left her privileged home background of Lissadell, Co. Sligo, Ireland, to live and work in Manchester. She devoted herself to the cause of women's labour rights and suffrage. As a friend of W. B. Yeats, Eva Gore-Booth's writings contributed to the Irish literary revival. Eva Gore-Booth suffered from tuberculosis and in 1920-21 (at the time this book came into her possession) she was travelling in Italy where she was studying Greek and Latin in order to write her study of the Fourth Gospel, published in 1923. Her interests were in religion and theosophy and the quotations recorded in this book are particularly poignant as by 1920 she knew she was terminally ill. The quotations show her wide range of reading. As one or two of the lines show slight inaccuracies it would perhaps indicate that she had written them from memory. Included is one of her own verses written earlier in 1912. All are highly personal and prescient. A separate list records them with their sources - see insertions. The text of The Imitation of Christ held particular relevance for Eva Gore-Booth and is a key work for Irish Catholics in its emphasis on the interior life and the Eucharist. This annotated copy is a rare survival of an individual who while having a very public campaigning spirit also led a life of humility and soul searching.

Physical description: 288 pages ; 16 cm.