Catalog 116, Awards, A
1. ADAMS, Richard. Watership Down. London/Australasia: Collings/Angus & Robertson (1974). The first Australian edition of Adams' first novel, winner of the Guardian award for children's fiction and the Library Association's Carnegie Medal for outstanding work by a children's author. A powerful, sad story of a group of rabbits that was adapted into an animated film, which, despite its format, was widely considered too violent for easy viewing by children. Near fine in a near fine dust jacket with narrow chipping at the front spine fold. An uncommon edition of a contemporary classic.
2. AI. Vice. NY: Norton (1999). A collection of poetry from her five previous titles, plus new poems. This copy is one of a self-made limited edition: signed and lettered by the author with a poem transcribed from the text, in holograph, on the flyleaf. Winner of the National Book Award for Poetry in 1999. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
3. AIKEN, Conrad. Collected Poems. NY: Oxford University Press, 1953. A collection of his poems covering a forty year span, selected by the author. Winner of the National Book Award for poetry in 1954. Aiken's earlier volume of Selected Poems, published in 1929, won the Pulitzer Prize. Fine in a near fine, modestly edgeworn and price-clipped dust jacket.
4. -. Same title. NY: Oxford University Press, 1970. Originally conceived as the second edition of Collected Poems, and stated as such on the spine, title page and dust jacket. However, this edition adds 150 more pages of poetry to the original edition, and in November of 1970 the dust jacket was changed to Collected Poems 1916-1970, with the title page and spine slated to follow suit in subsequent printings. This, then, is the first issue of the title Collected Poems 1916-1970, with the spine, title page and dust jacket all stating "Collected Poems, Second Edition." Inscribed by the author: "For Jake/ with love/ from Conrad/ 1970/ Wow!" Fine in a near fine dust jacket, on which the title has been changed to "Selected Poems, First Edition," in an unknown hand, presumably that of the recipient.
5. ALGREN, Nelson. The Man with the Golden Arm. Garden City: Doubleday, 1949. The first winner of the National Book Award. Inscribed by the author to Mary Jane Ward, author of The Snake Pit, a powerful novel about a woman's treatment in a mental institution, which was one of the bestselling novels of 1946 and was made into an award-winning movie two years later. Algren's novel was itself made into a movie in 1956. An excellent association copy, linking Algren's best-known work, a dark tale of drug addiction and the drug culture, with the author of a ground-breaking novel of a woman's fight with mental illness and the oppressive institutions that treated her illness -- a direct precursor to such novels as Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar. A fine copy, bearing Ward's bookplate on the front flyleaf, in a very good dust jacket with a few small edge chips. An uncommon book signed; rare as an association copy of this order.
6. ALVAREZ, Julia. How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents. Chapel Hill: Algonquin, 1991. The advance reading copy of her first work of fiction, a collection of interrelated stories. Winner of the PEN Oakland Award and a New York Times Book Review Notable Book of the year. Fine in wrappers.
7. ANDERSON, Jessica. Tirra Lirra by the River. (South Melbourne): (Macmillan) (1978). The first edition of her fourth novel, a contemporary Australian classic and winner of the Miles Franklin Award. Extremities and corners rubbed; near fine in a near fine, spine-faded dust jacket.
8. ASTURIAS, Miguel Ángel. Viento Fuerte. Guatemala: Editorial del Ministerio de Educacion Publica (1950). The true first edition of the first volume of his "Banana Republic Trilogy" -- a fictional treatment of the foreign control of the Central American banana industry; published in small quantities in the author's native Guatemala and the most difficult title in the trilogy, which was not published in an English translation until almost 20 years later -- the year Asturias was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. Asturias' early works were grounded in the mythology of the indigenous peoples of Guatemala; with this book, and the rest of the trilogy, he added to that an acute political awareness. His critique of the United Fruit Company, and the economic exploitation of native Guatemalans, helped earn him the Soviet Union's highest prize -- the Lenin Peace Prize -- putting Asturias in the small group of people who had won the highest honors in both the West and in the Communist bloc during the Cold War. His amalgam of local history and myth -- and the epistemological questions they raised -- with contemporary regional political concerns created a blueprint for the Latin American writers of the "boom" generation. Inscribed by the author in the year of publication. Pages browning with age; spine creased and browned; a very good copy in self-wrappers.
9. ASTURIAS, Miguel Angel. Week-End En Guatemala. Buenos Aires: Goyanarte (1956). A novel based on the US-backed overthrow of the Arbenz government in Guatemala in 1954 -- a Cold War-related move against a left-leaning nationalist government that did much to set the stage for the next three decades of tensions between the U.S. and the various Central American republics. Asturias, for his open criticism of Yanqui interventionism, was awarded the Lenin Peace Prize in 1966 -- the highest such honor conferred in the old U.S.S.R. The following year -- in what may be construed as a battle for the hearts and minds of his constituency -- he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, the West's highest international honor. A major novel by one of the most important writers of the postwar era, whose ability to integrate indigenous myths and social protest was a major accomplishment that helped shape the contemporary Latin American novel. Abrasions to front flyleaf and front cover; ink marks to three pages of text; some wear to top edge and creasing to spine; still a respectable copy in self-wraps.
10. ASTURIAS, Miguel Angel. Los Ojos de Los Enterrados. Buenos Aires: Losada (1960). The first edition of the final installment of Asturias' Banana Republic Trilogy. An attractive, very good copy in illustrated self-wraps.
11. ASTURIAS, Miguel Angel. Mulata de Tal. Buenos Aires: Losada (1963). A "magical realist" novel by the Guatemalan Nobel Prize winner, who attempted to incorporate a mythic perspective -- and not coincidentally, a native American mythos -- into his writings. Inscribed by the author. Near fine in self-wrappers. A fragile book, issued in oversize wrappers and very scarce in good condition, let alone signed.
12. AUDEN, W.H. The Shield of Achilles. NY: Random House (1955). National Book Award label tipped to front panel. Bears two owner signatures on the title page; worn cloth at the crown; else near fine in a very good dust jacket with a small chip on the rear panel.