Catalog 119, M
144. MACLEAN, Norman. A River Runs Through It. Chicago: U. of Chicago (1976). His first book, a collection of related angling stories. Maclean was a professor at the University of Chicago for many years, and had told versions of these stories, over the years, to a number of people who encouraged him, finally, to write them down. He was nearing eighty when he did, and the University of Chicago Press agreed to publish the collection -- the first book of "fiction" ever published by the press. A glowing review in an angling journal and the subsequent word-of-mouth led to an increasing demand for the book and the rest, as they say, is history: numerous editions were done in various formats -- an illustrated "gift edition," a trade paperback and a fine press signed limited edition -- before being transformed into an award-winning film. The first printing, however, was only 1577 copies. A fine copy in a supplied, price-clipped near fine dust jacket.
145. MALAMUD, Bernard. The Natural. NY: Harcourt Brace (1952). His first book, one of the great baseball novels of all time and the basis, decades later, for a well-received movie. Owner name front flyleaf and trace sunning to spine crown; else a fine copy of the issue in red boards, in a very good, mildly spine and edge-sunned dust jacket with several small chips and tears. No priority has been established but copies in both the red and the blue boards appear to be considerably scarcer than copies in gray board, although not necessarily earlier.
146. MALAMUD, Bernard. The Assistant. NY: Farrar, Straus, Cudahy (1957). Inscribed by the author. Trace wear to extremities of spine cloth; else fine in a very good first issue dust jacket with one internally tape-mended edge tear, a couple small spots on the spine, and a partially erased pencil line on the front panel. A very attractive copy of a book that often turns up with a frayed jacket and/or faded spine, and seldom appears signed.
147. MANRIQUE, Jaime. Colombian Gold. NY: Clarkson N. Potter (1983). A review copy of the Colombian author's first book to appear in English, a thriller. Inscribed by the author to film critic Pauline Kael "with greatest love." Kael provided a blurb for the dust jacket: "Colombian Gold is like reading a movie... a film noir running wild." Other blurbs are by Manuel Puig, John Ashbery and William Burroughs -- an eclectic assortment that would seem to be a testament to the author's cultural integrity, literary sensibility, and progressive avant garde perspective, respectively. Fine in a fine dust jacket, with promotional photos laid in.
148. MATTHIESSEN, Peter. Wildlife in America. NY: Viking, 1959. Matthiessen's first book of nonfiction, a survey of the effect of the Europeans on the fauna of North America and a classic in the field of conservation literature. Shortly after publication, the publisher reported that President John F. Kennedy had added the book to the White House's permanent library. Matthiessen was one of the first primarily "literary" authors to devote his energy to writing about ecological issues, eventually incorporating them and the political questions that they raise into his fiction in a way that set the stage for the generation of socially conscious writers to come. His interest in non-Western ways of perception and knowing -- drawn from tribal traditions as well as from the mystical heritage of the East -- combined with his social concerns to raise the standard for serious, environmentally conscious writers of fiction and other literature. A couple spots to foredge; else fine in a near fine, lightly rubbed dust jacket. A very attractive copy of a book that shows wear easily.
149. -. Another copy. Signed by the author. Fading to top stain; else fine in a very good, price-clipped dust jacket with modest edge wear and foxing and some light rubbing to the folds.
150. MATTHIESSEN, Peter. The Shorebirds of North America. NY: Viking (1967). The extremely scarce signed limited edition of this title: one of 350 numbered copies signed by Matthiessen, editor Gardner Stout, painter Robert Clem and Ralph Palmer, who provided species accounts. Bound in full leather. Fine in a fine slipcase. Although the limitation of 350 is sizable enough that copies would be expected to turn up in the market with a fair amount of frequency, our experience is that this title very seldom appears, presumably because it is collectable in more than one field -- i.e., both as literature (Matthiessen) and as natural history/ornithology. One of the nicest copies we've ever seen of this attractive and fragile book.
151. MATTHIESSEN, Peter. The Valley. Sagaponack, 1972. Photocopied typescript of the first draft of an unproduced screenplay, set in the border area of California and Mexico. Around the time he would have been writing this script, Matthiessen had been spending time with Cesar Chavez and the Mexican migrant workers, which forms the backdrop to this story. Near fine in Duo-Tang binder.
152. MATTHIESSEN, Peter. The Snow Leopard. NY: Viking (1978). His National Book Award-winning volume, recounting a trip to the Himalayas with naturalist George Schaller in the hopes both of encountering a snow leopard in the wild and of coming to terms with his wife's recent death from cancer. Signed by the author. Matthiessen combines natural history, personal reflection and an exploration of the Buddhist religion native to the area. His study, and practice, of Buddhism later resulted in his becoming an ordained Zen priest. Top edge foxed; boards edge-sunned and lightly bowed; near fine in a very good, price-clipped dust jacket with spine-sunning and one edge tear. Salon Magazine's top travel book of the century.
153. -. Another copy. Inscribed by the author to Dr. Kawamura "who assisted us so generously/ with our sick sherpa/ at Murwa (on the return from/ the Kitasato Kanjiroba Expedition)/ with many thanks, and/ best wishes." Matthiessen recounts this portion of the trip -- and the increasingly sick sherpa's plight -- on pages 272-288 of the book. Upon their arrival in Murwa -- still a four-day journey from any town likely to have a doctor -- they encountered a Japanese climbing expedition that had just returned from climbing Kanjiroba. The leader of the expedition was Dr. Kawamura, who took care of the sherpa, Dawa, and gave him and the other members of Matthiessen's party pills for a highly contagious form of dysentery, thereby averting not only the sherpa's likely death but possibly the contamination of the others in a remote location far from help. Kawamura refused any payment, but Matthiessen apparently later sent him a copy of the book about his trip. Fine in a very near fine dust jacket with a touch of spine fading. A wonderful association copy.
154. MATTHIESSEN, Peter. The Birds of Heaven. Travels with Cranes. NY: North Point Press (2001). The uncorrected proof copy of Matthiessen's most recent book, published in November, 2001. A bit of shallow scratching to front panel; very near fine in wrappers.
155. (MAUGHAM, W. Somerset). The Maugham Enigma. NY: Citadel Press (1954). An anthology edited by Klaus Jonas, and including pieces by Malcolm Cowley, Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene, V.S. Pritchett, Theodore Dreiser, and many others. Owner initials front flyleaf; foredge foxing; near fine in a dusty, spine-tanned dust jacket; about near fine.
156. MAXWELL, William. Typed Letters Signed. March 5, 1981 and August 3, 1995. Two one-page letters, written 14 years apart, to the teacher Wesley Hartley in response to Hartley's students' question on the importance of his, Maxwell's, high school education. In both letters, Maxwell quotes Saul Bellow, "A writer is a reader who is moved to emulation," and he recounts his passion for reading, from Treasure Island, to books by Conrad, De Morgan, Shaw, Barrie and H.G. Wells (in the earlier letter) to Galsworthy, Shaw and Barrie (in the later letter). Also in the later letter, Maxwell claims that, "After that, the first year of college was something of a let-down," but in the first letter he does speak well of his "unusually gifted" freshman composition teacher who "read my first theme aloud in class as an example of how not to write..." He also covers, briefly, his education at The New Yorker, where he learned from his colleagues "the difference between saying and not saying what you mean. I believe good writing ultimately can be reduced to that one thing." Both letters signed by the author, the first with several holograph corrections. Folded for mailing; else fine.
157. McALLISTER, Bruce. Dream Baby. NY: TOR (1989). Second printing of this novel about an Army nurse in Vietnam who can see the wounds she will have to treat before they happen. In fact, it is the first novel about the CIA's experiments with mind control and ESP in the Vietnam war, based on the author's extensive research into the subject of combat-induced ESP, which led him to CIA studies of the same phenomena. Signed by the author in 1992. Near fine in a fine dust jacket.
158. McCARTHY, Cormac. The Orchard Keeper. NY: Random House (1965). McCarthy's first book, which won a Faulkner Foundation Award for best first novel of the year. Although the book was successful enough to go into a second printing, fewer than 3000 copies were sold in total, and it was a quarter century before McCarthy's All the Pretty Horses won the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award and brought him recognition beyond the small, passionate circle of devotees who had been reading him and collecting his books all along. This book is notorious for several flaws: the front flap tends to detach at the fold, from slightly excessive scoring in the bindery, and the white jacket is susceptible to yellowing and soiling. This is a fine copy in a very near fine dust jacket with a faint shade of spine-tanning and a tiny bit of gray rubbing to the white rear panel. In all, a beautiful copy of an important first book that is seldom found in this condition.
159. McCARTHY, Cormac. Blood Meridian. NY: Random House (1985). His fifth book, a powerful novel of the Old West, based on an actual series of events in 1849-1850 in Texas and Mexico, and rendered with an eye to bringing to life the surreal violence of the time and place.The faintest possible offsetting to front flyleaf and foxing to top edge; still fine in a fine dust jacket with a tiny, barely visible nick at the front flap fold. Without the remainder marking so common to this title.
160. McCARTHY, Cormac. All the Pretty Horses. NY: Knopf, 1992. The uncorrected proof copy of the first volume of the Border Trilogy, a landmark novel that won both the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award and propelled its author to literary celebrity after nearly three decades of writing well-received literary novels in relative obscurity. All the Pretty Horses sold ten times as many copies in hardcover as all five of his previous novels combined. This is the first state of the proof, which reads "A Border Trilogy." Later this was changed to read "The Border Trilogy." Fine in wrappers.
161. McCLANAHAN, Ed. A Congress of Wonders. Washington: Counterpoint (1996). Three linked stories set in Kentucky during World War II, by a Kentucky author who was a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford at the same time as Ken Kesey and Robert Stone, among others. Kesey and Stone provide two of the blurbs used on the dust jacket of the book. Signed by the author. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
162. McCLURE, Michael. Dream Table. San Francisco: Dave Haselwood, 1965. A partial (?) deck of 29 poetry cards: one title card, one author card, 27 cards with two words each. The bibliography indicates there were 30 cards in the set. Verso of each features a tree and a lion. 2-1/2" x 3-1/2". Edge tears to one card; else fine.
163. McCLURE, Michael. The Surge. (n.p.): Frontier Press, 1969. A single long poems, bound in fold-out stapled wrappers. One spot to the upper margin of the first page; else fine. From novelist Don Carpenter's library.
164. (McCLURE, Michael). Ticket for "The Beard." San Francisco: (n.p.), 1969. A combination invitation/ticket for the premiere performance of "The Beard." In postcard form, hand-addressed and initialed by McClure. The ticket was for writer Don Carpenter and his wife, from whose estate this came; they must not have attended the show or they would not have still had the ticket, one presumes. Near fine.
165. McEWAN, Ian. Soursweet. London: Faber & Faber (1988). Screenplay by Booker Prize-winning author McEwan, based on the Booker-nominated novel by Timothy Mo. Signed by McEwan. Paperback original; fine. Uncommon, especially signed.
166. McMURTRY, Larry. Horseman, Pass By. NY: Harper (1961). McMurtry's first book, one of A.C. Greene's "50 best books on Texas," basis for the movie Hud, and winner of the Jesse H. Jones Award from the Texas Institute of Letters for the best novel of the year. McMurtry's last draft of this novel was dated August, 1960, just before he entered Wallace Stegner's Stanford writing workshop, where he wrote part of his second novel, Leaving Cheyenne. Among the other students there in the late 1950s and early 60s were Ken Kesey, Robert Stone, Tillie Olsen, Wendell Berry and Ed McClanahan, among others. Horseman, Pass By, which takes its title from the closing lines of William Butler Yeats's poem "Under Ben Bulben" (as did Mary McCarthy's first novel, Cast a Cold Eye), was a breakthrough in Texas literature and in regional literature in general: by telling a raw, unadulterated story entirely fitting to its contemporary West Texas setting, McMurtry not only brought the regional novel out of its quaint gentility but gave it a universality it could not have had otherwise: it has been called a West Texas Catcher in the Rye, with the caveat that the lives of Texans in general were a little more crude than those of the Easterners in Salinger's novel. Faint offsetting to front flyleaf and a small shallow dent to front board; still fine in a fine dust jacket with the tiniest bit of rubbing to the rear spine fold; one of the nicest copies of this book we have seen in years.
167. McMURTRY, Larry. In a Narrow Grave. Austin: Encino Press, 1968. McMurtry's first book of nonfiction, a collection of essays on Texas. Done by a small press in Austin, the first printing was so rife with typographical errors that it was destroyed; reportedly only 15 copies survived. This is one of those copies, with "skycrapers" for "skyscrapers" on page 105. Signed by the author. Fine in a fine dust jacket. Easily the scarcest book in the McMurtry canon, and this is a beautiful copy of it.
168. McMURTRY, Larry. Booked Up, Catalog 1. Washington, D.C., 1971. The first book catalog issued by McMurtry's rare book store. An offering of first editions, from James Agee to Arnold Zweig, along with a handful of collections, including an extraordinary Stone & Kimball collection. McMurtry, in addition to being a novelist, essayist and screenwriter, has been a bookseller since the late 1950s, and his Washington, D.C., store has been a landmark in the rare book community. He has since embarked on turning his boyhood home of Archer City, Texas, into a book town, with hundreds of thousands of used and rare books for sale throughout the small town. An interesting look at one of his early professional efforts as a rare book dealer. Quarto. Fine in stapled wrappers.
169. McPHEE, John. A Sense of Where You Are. NY: FSG (1965). The first book by this Pulitzer Prize-winning author, a profile of former New Jersey Senator Bill Bradley done at the time when he was a Princeton basketball player and Rhodes scholar. A portion of this book first appeared as a "Profile" in The New Yorker, where McPhee's prose in the 1960s and 1970s helped elevate nonfiction writing to the realm of literary art. Cocked and bowed; a very good copy in a very good, spine-faded dust jacket with slight edge wear.
170. McPHEE, John. Oranges. NY: FSG (1967). McPhee's third book, an infinitely fascinating and entertaining study of oranges in history, biology and culture. McPhee has been credited with being one of the foremost "literary journalists" practicing today -- indeed, with helping to create the genre -- and his subjects are often rooted firmly in the natural world. With a reporting style in which the narrator is seldom visible, and almost never a "participant" in the story, McPhee differs markedly from many of the literary naturalists writing today -- opting to let his choice of topics, and the individuals whom he chooses to interview for their perspectives, define the political, social and moral implications of the subject. In plain but nonetheless elegant prose, McPhee consistently reveals wonders of the world that would otherwise remain completely unknown to the general reader. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
171. -. Another copy. Sunning to board edges; near fine in a very good dust jacket with internally tape-repaired tears at the spine crown and a trace of color added.
172. McPHEE, John. The Pine Barrens. NY: FSG (1968). His fourth book, one of his scarcest, and a classic of this kind of reporting: McPhee covers history, natural history, and biography, and in so doing reveals in depth a previously all-but-hidden corner of the world, a wilderness in the heart of the eastern Boston-Richmond megalopolis that occupies one-quarter of the state of New Jersey and is as large as Grand Canyon National Park. Label partially removed from front pastedown; else fine in a very near fine, price-clipped dust jacket with a bit of fading to the yellow spine lettering.
173. McPHEE, John. The Curve of Binding Energy. NY: FSG (1974). A lengthy profile of Theodore Taylor, a nuclear physicist who spent years working on an eventually-aborted project to develop a spaceship powered by exploding atomic bombs. In later years he became an expert in preventing the "diversion" of nuclear materials to help limit nuclear proliferation. McPhee's explication of the concepts of nuclear physics necessary to tell this story is remarkable. Fine in a dust jacket foxed on verso; externally fine.
174. McPHEE, John. Pieces of the Frame. NY: FSG (1975). One of McPhee's scarcest books, undoubtedly made even more so by virtue of its flimsy, "perfect-bound" construction, whereby the pages, rather than being sewn in signatures, are glued, one-by-one, to the spine. Because it is a collection of diverse short pieces, rather than a book on a single subject, this title probably had a slightly smaller print run than others of his from the same period. However, in our experience, it is considerably scarcer than those other titles, a fact probably explained by its construction. Slight fading to top stain; else fine in a fine dust jacket.
175. McPHEE, John. Annals of the Former World. NY: FSG (1983). A two-volume limited edition, reprinting two of McPhee's books on geology, Basin and Range and In Suspect Terrain, in a uniform binding and pictorial slipcase, each volume signed by the author. One of 450 numbered copies, although it turns up less frequently than the limitation alone would seem to warrant. Fine in the publisher's slipcase. A later collection, which added three more of McPhee's works on geology but was published under this same title, won the Pulitzer Prize for 1998.
176. McPHEE, John. In the Highlands and Islands. London: Faber & Faber (1986). First thus, a paperback original collecting "The Crofter and the Laird," "Josie's Well," "Pieces of the Frame," and "From Birnam Wood to Dunsinane." Trace rubbing to edges; near fine in wrappers. One of McPhee's scarcer titles.
177. (McPHEE, John). "Burn Those Worthless Cookbooks" in The Saturday Evening Post, October 3, 1964. Philadelphia: Curtis Publishing, 1964. An early essay by McPhee, preceding his first book. Mailing label and corner crease to front cover; near fine.
178. (McPHEE, John). Roadkills. Easthampton: Cheloniidae Press, 1981. A fine press limited edition of this collection of prose and poetry by McPhee, Gary Snyder, William Stafford, Richard Eberhart, Madeline DeFrees and Gillian Conoley, with etching and wood engravings by Alan James Robinson. Of a total edition of 300 copies, this is one of 250 numbered copies signed by the artist. Printed by Harold McGrath. The volume contains a suite of six wood engravings printed on Cha-u-ke and titled and signed by the artist. The engraving was printed by Robinson himself, at Cheloniidae Press. 9" x 12", 22 leaves, quarter bound in leather with "tire tracks" blind stamped. A fine copy in a quarter morocco clamshell box, with tire tracks in blind on the box spine (a bit scuffed). A highly original and elegant production and quite uncommon these days.
179. -. Same title, the deluxe edition. One of 50 copies signed by Robinson and the six authors -- McPhee, Snyder, Stafford, Eberhart, DeFrees and Conoley. In addition to the authors' signatures, the deluxe edition features an additional suite of the illustrations, each signed by the artist, in separate cloth portfolio. All elements fine in clamshell box. The deluxe edition went out of print almost immediately after publication. This has been called one of the finest, if not the finest, book produced by the Press.
180. MEWSHAW, Michael. Man in Motion. NY: Random House (1970). The dedication copy of his first novel, inscribed in the month of publication to Dr. Herbert Schaumann, "who gave of his time,/ energy, and friendship when no/ one else knew or cared./ With gratitude and affection,/ Michael Mewshaw." Dr. Schaumann is one of three dedicatees of this book, the others being the author's mother and the novelist George Garrett, who was the author's writing teacher at the University of Virginia. Fading to cloth edges; small stains to foredges of two pages; near fine in a near fine dust jacket with a couple tiny corner chips and a small ink number on the rear panel.
181. MICHENER, James A. The Source. NY: Random House (1965). A massive novel focusing on one village in Galilee over a period of thousands of years. Fine in a near fine dust jacket with a tear at the lower front panel and one to the front spine fold.
182. MOODY, Rick. The Double Zero. (n.p.): McSweeney's, 2000. An individually bound story published as part of the assemblage of bound works that made up Timothy McSweeney's Quarterly Concern 4, here offered separately and signed by the author. Fine in stapled wrappers.
183. MOORE, Marianne. The Fables of La Fontaine. NY: Viking (1954). Top stain faded; else a fine copy in a very good, spine-faded dust jacket. Together with two typed letters signed to Frederick Adams, president of the Grolier Club, dated January and July, 1949. In each Moore praises the work of Adams and a book by Oscar Ogg which Adams apparently presented to her. Each letter folded for mailing; else fine, with envelopes.
184. MOORE, Robin. The French Connection. Boston: Little Brown (1969). Nonfiction, about a famous drug case, written in the style of a novel. Moore wrote several books in this style in the 1960s and early 1970s, notably The Green Berets. Like Truman Capote's In Cold Blood, his books helped blur the line between fiction and nonfiction, helping lead to both the New Journalism and the so-called "nonfiction novel." Basis for the movie starring Gene Hackman, which made "Popeye Doyle" into a household name and won Oscars for Best Picture, Best Actor (Hackman), Best Director and Best Screenplay. Fine in a near fine, rubbed and price-clipped dust jacket.
185. MORRISON, Toni. From Sula. Madison: Silver Buckle Press, 1990. A broadside excerpt from her 1973 novel Sula, printed in honor of Morrison's 1990 visit to the University of Wisconsin-Madison. One of 200 copies. 13" x 19-3/4", attractively printed letterpress on Magnani Italia paper, with cloud images in three colors as well as the text. Signed by the author. Fine. Uncommon.
186. MUNRO, Alice. Selected Stories. A Tribute. (n.d.) : McClelland & Stewart (1997). A promotional booklet issued to accompany Selected Stories and including the 7-page essay "About this Book" by Munro. Also prints review excerpts by Richard Ford, A.S. Byatt, and a host of anonymous others; a brief biography; praise from the publisher; and a one-page excerpt from an interview with Peter Gzowski. Fine in stapled wrappers. Uncommon ephemeral piece.