Signature query...

[Merlin]

Hi everyone,

 

I recently purchased an old collected poems of Thomas Hood book.

 

It's publishing date is 1920, which is long after Thomas was around to write anything.

 

I have seen three other poet books in this series, but mine is a little different...because it is signed, by Thomas.

 

At first I thought it was printed, but you can very clearly see just the signature coming through the page.

 

Wikipedia shows Tom Hood, his son, as having been an editor and playwright, but he too expired long before 1920.

 

Are there any other famous Hood writing descendants?

 

I found a photo of Thomas Hood writing for sale in a past auction. A lot of the signature looks the same, but some elements are starkly different.

 

I have no idea which Hood signed this. I'd also love to get a value on it.

 

Can any of you help, please?

 

Thank you.

 

[Janet]

I think your assumption that it's a printed signature is probably the right one.   

 

Even though you can see it through the page - that's possibly just to do with printing and paper quality of the time.

 

If you Google "Thomas Hood signature" in Google images, the first three results are the same as yours - this one shows it from a 1906 edition and to me it looks absolutely identical.  

 

The only real way to find out for sure is to take it to an antiquarian book dealer and ask their advice - they might be able to tell you straight away, or point you in the right direction.  I would say it was impossible to verify its authenticity - or otherwise - from a computer screen. 

[Merlin]

Hi Janet,

 

Many thanks for your response.

 

Great link! That does look identical to me and is more than sufficient to put my mind and query at ease.

 

I thought I'd stumbled upon something very strange, due to the lines and the fact that the other series books didn't have signatures.

 

I did show my copy to a local dealer, but we're very pretty much in the country out this way and he was a bit lost with it.

 

Kind regards,

 

Nic