POE, Edgar Allan. [The Purloined Letter.] The Gift: A Christmas, New Year, and Birthday Present. Philadelphia: Carey and Hart, 1845. First edition, 8vo (221 x 136mm.) Engraved frontispiece and vignette to title, 6 engraved plates, tissue-guards. (Toning, spotting to tissues.) Original publisher’s polished calf, ornate gilt to covers and spine, g.e. (some fading to gilt, toned, light rubbing). Note: contains the first appearance in print of Poe’s story ‘The Purloined Letter’. Probably the most celebrated and contested detective story of all time, Poe’s story was an early forerunner of the detective genre while also initiating the trope of the amateur detective who triumphs over a blundering police force. Later, in the 1960’s and 1970’s it was the central text of a critical theory debate between Jacques Lacan’s structuralist approach and Jacque Derrida’s deconstructive reading.