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Shelley's letters fetch
￡45,600
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A recently discovered set of letters by the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley
have sold for ￡45,600 at a London auction.
The letters were written to Ralph Wedgwood - a member of the pottery
family - between December 1810 and February 1811.
Shelley was studying at Oxford University at the time.
The letters, which provide an insight into
Shelley's views on atheism ,
were destined for a car boot sale until the owner contacted the auction
house.
They were found in a trunk at a house in south-west London alongside
four written by Shelley's best friend Thomas Jefferson Hogg, and were
expected to fetch ￡30,000.
The finder, thought to be a descendant of the Wedgwood family, then
left the letters to a neighbour who contacted Christie's auction house.
Shelley and Hogg were expelled from Oxford
University in 1811 for writing a pamphlet
about atheism.
Both men were summoned before the authorities when the article was
circulated. Shelley refused to co-operate and Hogg protested.
The eight letters by the pair shed light on Shelley's eventual
emergence as a rebel poet and the theme of atheism in his work.
In one he wrote: "Christ never existed... the fall of man, the whole
fabric indeed of superstition which it supports can no longer obtain the
credit of philosophers."
Christie's said the correspondence fills an important gap in
historians' understanding of Shelley's intellectual development and his
expulsion from Oxford.
Head of books Crispin Jackson said the letters were kept for the
Wedgwood connection rather than their famous author.
They were sold for ￡45,600, including buyer's premium, in a valuable
books and manuscripts sale.
(BBC) | 
Updated: 2005-06-09 08:48
