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Lot 216: Alexander Pope Signed Letter 1720

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Lot  216: Alexander Pope Signed Letter 1720
<b>Autographs</b><hr><b>ALEXANDER POPE, English poet. </b>
Autograph Letter Signed ('A. Pope'), 1 page, 8' x 2', no place, no date (although the date August 2, 1720, is docketed on the verso. To the Reverend Mr. Pitt, Rector of Pimpenne near Blandford in Dorsetshire (Pope lived, since 1719, in a pretty house on Lord DenbighÕs estate, Twickenham, in Blandford). Co-signed 'Your most affectionate friends and servant' by PopeÕs own Boswell, the anecdotalist and scholar Joseph Spence, a professor of poetry at Oxford. Choice Fine; slightly worn at folds and faintly discolored in spots, not affecting text. In full: 'Sir, I have the opportunity of assuring you, you have, at the place from which this letter is dated, a friend and servant.'

This simple note no doubt can tell a story, like all things connected to Alexander Pope, of whom Dr. Johnson so aptly said, 'He hardly drank tea without a stratagem.'