Catalog 131, C-D
51. CAMILLERI, Andrea. The Terra-Cotta Dog. (n.p.): Viking (2002). The advance reading copy of the second novel in the author's highly praised Inspector Montalbano mystery series, set in Sicily. Covers splayed; near fine in wrappers.
52. CANIN, Ethan. Emperor of the Air. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1988. The uncorrected proof copy of his highly acclaimed first book, a collection of stories that won a Houghton Mifflin Literary Fellowship. Signed by the author. Canin is one of the handful of writers who were selected by both Granta magazine and The New Yorker as among the 20 best young American writers. An uncommon proof, especially signed. Fine in wrappers.
53. CAREY, Peter. My Life as a Fake. (n.p.): Faber and Faber (2003). The uncorrected proof copy of the first British edition of the most recent novel by this two-time Booker Prize winner. Corners tapped; near fine in wrappers.
54. CARSON, Rachel. Food from the Sea: Fish and Shellfish of New England. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of the Interior, 1943. A 74-page booklet written by Carson in her position as aquatic biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The first of four such Conservation Bulletins Carson wrote, each focusing on a different geographic region. Owner stamps on front cover and title page; author name on cover; narrow abrasion rear cover; shallow midline fold. Very good in stapled wrappers.
55. CARSON, Rachel. Food from Home Waters: Fishes of the Middle West. (Washington, D.C.): U.S. Department of the Interior (1943). A 44-page booklet by Carson, the second of her four Conservation Bulletins. Owner stamp front cover; mild corner creasing; near fine in stapled wrappers.
56. CARSON, Rachel. Fish and Shellfish of the Middle Atlantic Coast. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of the Interior, 1945. A 32-page booklet. Pages a bit edge-darkened; near fine in stapled wrappers.
57. CARSON, Rachel. The Sea Around Us. NY: Oxford University Press, 1951. Third printing of her second book, winner of the National Book Award and the John Burroughs Medal, and the book that would have served as more than adequate legacy had she not surpassed herself by writing Silent Spring. Signed by the author. Some tanning to page edges and rubbing to boards; near fine in a very good, sunned jacket with chipping to the edges.
58. CARVER, Raymond. Will You Please Be Quiet, Please? NY: McGraw-Hill (1976). Carver's first collection of stories, which was nominated for the National Book Award and was the first book to bring him recognition beyond the small circle of literary insiders familiar with his work from the quarterlies and his small press volumes. These stories provoked a trend of "minimalist" writing that, for a time, was the dominant mode in American short fiction. And while Carver's stories never strove for nor attained the kind of "pure" minimalism that others embodied -- and minimalism itself faded into literary obscurity -- Carver reinvigorated the short story form as no other American writer had since Hemingway, with a spare and resolute voice that could not be dismissed. Near fine in a near fine, price-clipped dust jacket. One of the most important books of fiction of the 1970s.
59. CARVER, Raymond. "Like his late father, Joel Gardner is interested in the powers of light and dark..." [Burlington]: [Shadow Editions] [1986]. A large broadside, 20" x 15 3/4", on heavy white paper, originally issued together with a portfolio of photographs by Joel Gardner, son of John Gardner, the late novelist and a teacher, mentor and friend to Carver before he died in a motorcycle accident at age 42. There were only 60 sets of the photographs prepared -- 50 numbered sets and 10 lettered -- and an unknown, presumably small, number of copies of the broadside over and above those 60. Signed by Carver. Faint foxing in the lower margin; else fine. Very uncommon.
60. (CARVER, Raymond). Quarry, No. 1. (Santa Cruz): (University of California) (1972). The first issue of this literary magazine, edited by Raymond Carver. Contributors include William Kittredge and Jon Jackson (preceding both of their first books by six years), Richard Hugo, Leonard Michaels, Gordon Lish and others, but not James Welch. From the "Contributers" notes: "James Welch never sent any poems" (Carver's comment?). Quarto; fine in wrappers. An early, uncommon Carver item.
61. -. Another copy. Light stain to upper foredge and corner creasing to front cover and early pages; near fine in wrappers.
62. CATHER, Willa. Sapphira and the Slave Girl. NY: Knopf, 1940. Cather's final novel, set in Virginia, where Cather spent her childhood. This is a pre-Civil War story of an aging aristocrat who tries to ruin the life of her slave girl because she believes she has had a sexual relationship with Sapphira's husband. A tale of race, sex and class, it is both an escape narrative and a critique of the place of women in a society dominated by men, especially the powerless slave and the aging, and thus equally powerless, mistress of the house. This is the limited edition, one of 520 numbered copies signed by the author. Top edge gilt; silk ribbon marker bound in. Bookplate front pastedown; a fine copy in a mildly spine-sunned dust wrapper and slipcase. An exceptionally crisp, attractive copy of this handsomely made book.
63. CHATWIN, Bruce. On the Black Hill. London: Jonathan Cape (1982). The third book by the author of In Patagonia, and his first novel; winner of the Whitbread Prize. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
64. CHESNUTT, Charles W. The Conjure Woman. Boston: Houghton Mifflin (1899). The first book by the writer generally considered to be the first great black novelist, a writer who introduced slave culture and its African underpinnings to white readers and, especially in his later works, focused on issues of race and racial discrimination, and miscegenation -- a subject that was virtually taboo at the time. As a light-skinned black, whose parents came from mixed race families, the issue was important to him and one that he felt strongly should be a part of the national dialogue. He published his first short story at the age of 26, and later became the first African American to be published by the Atlantic Monthly, which accepted his story, "The Goophered Grapevine," the first story in this collection. Owner signature of Clinton B. Adams, probably the Philadelphia Congregationalist minister, on front free endpaper, with a 1900 date. A few marginal marks to text; light wear to cloth; a very good copy, without dust jacket.
65. CHESTERTON, Gilbert K. The Napoleon of Notting Hill. London/NY: John Lane/Bodley Head, 1904. Chesterton's first novel, a fantasy set in a future London of 1984; considered by many to have been a precursor to George Orwell's famous novel, which also deals with the troubles inherent in an authoritarian state. Illustrations by W. Graham Robertson. Small ownership stamps to title page and front pastedown; offsetting and tape shadows to free endpapers; a very good copy without dust jacket.
66. CHILD, Lee. Die Trying. NY: Putnam (1998). The first American edition of the second Jack Reacher thriller, by the author of Killing Floor. Inscribed by Child. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
67. COETZEE, J.M. White Writing. On the Culture of Letters in South Africa. (Sandton): Radix (1988). The first South African edition of the first book-length work of criticism by the recent Nobel Prize winner. A history and survey of South African literature in the years prior to World War II, and therefore before the institutionalization of apartheid in 1948: Coetzee is exploring the literature for the cultural underpinnings of the racist state. Near fine in wrappers.
68. CRACE, Jim. Continent. London: Heinemann, 1986. His first book, a collection of related stories that won the Whitbread Prize, the David Higham Prize for Fiction, and the Guardian Fiction Prize. Fine in a fine dust jacket with the promotional sticker, "You can afford to make the journey."
69. CRICHTON, Michael. The Terminal Man. London: Jonathan Cape (1972). The first British edition of this novel of the intersection of science and ethics, in which the brain of a violent criminal is connected to a computer to regulate his behavior.
70. CULLEN, Countee. The Ballad of the Brown Girl. NY: Harper & Brothers, 1927. The second book by the leading poet of the Harlem Renaissance, who won more literary awards in the 1920s than any other black writer, including the Witter Bynner Poetry Prize in 1925 and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Billed as "an old ballad retold," the attractively designed book featured illustrations and decorations by Charles Cullen. Embossed owner stamp on title page; label removal shadow front pastedown; some sunning to boards and spine label; a very good copy, without the original slipcase.
71. CULLEN, Countee. Copper Sun. NY: Harper & Brothers, 1927. His third book and second major collection of poems, after Colors in 1925. Embossed owner stamp on title page; abraded name from flyleaf and small corner chip there; faint dampstaining to pages at the joint, not affecting text. Still a crisp, very good copy in marbled paper boards, without dust jacket.
72. (CULLEN, Countee). Caroling Dusk. An Anthology of Verse By Negro Poets. NY: Harper & Brothers, 1927. An important anthology, edited by Cullen and with decorations by Aaron Douglas, whose stark images adorned many of the most important African American books of the time, and with contributions by James Weldon Johnson, Langston Hughes, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Sterling Brown, Claude McKay, Jessie Fauset and Jean Toomer, among many others. Spine label absent; else near fine, without dust jacket.
73. CUMMINGS, E.E. 50 Poems. NY: Duell, Sloan and Pearce (1940). Third printing. Inscribed by Cummings in 1953 to David Perkins. Also signed by Marion Moorehouse, to whom this volume is dedicated. Perkins is a literary historian and a scholar of poetry, best-known for his two-volume History of Modern Poetry, published by Harvard University Press in 1987 and considered the landmark book in its field. Pencilled notes on rear free endpaper, presumably those of Perkins; spot to foredge; near fine in a very good, price-clipped dust jacket with some spotting to the spine and chipped to the crown. Overall quite an attractive copy and a significant literary association copy.
74. DALAI LAMA. Freedom in Exile. (NY): HarperCollins (1990). The first American edition of the autobiography of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama of Tibet. Inscribed by the author, in Tibetan, to Dr. Robert B. Livingston, one of the founders of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985, an award given to the Dalai Lama in 1989. The inscription translates: "To Mr. Bob Livingston, a special friend who is a scientific expert worthy of esteem. Please accept this autobiography of mine as thanks for the great debt (owed) for your praiseworthy assistance. I pray that whatever immediate and long-term aspirations you may have will be spontaneously accomplished. Dalai Lama, 92/10/9." The book is again inscribed to Livingston by Alexander Norman, who assisted in the writing of the book and is credited at the end of the foreword by the Dalai Lama thusly: "...I wish to offer my thanks to the concerned officers of the Tibetan Government in Exile and to Mr. Alexander Norman for his assistance..." Norman's inscription reads: "Bob, Thank goodness -- I never imagined that anyone would scrutinize my efforts so closely, nor quite what an awesome privilege it would be. With warmest regards, Alexander Norman. Dharamsala, 10 Oct. 92." Norman has also noted two production errors in the edition; and Livingston has heavily marked the text, with underlining, marginalia of various sorts, and occasional comments. A fascinating volume, not only linking two Nobel Peace Prize winners, but also linking the traditions of East and West -- the Dalai Lama's religious and spiritual traditions and Livingston's Western scientific expertise and understanding. The Dalai Lama, while in exile from his native Tibet, has been since his early childhood an advocate of linking the understandings available to the disparate traditions of the East and West, and in particular those of the mystical stream of his Tibetan Buddhism with the secular understanding of Western science. This book, in the words of the giver and the actions of the recipient, is an embodiment of that goal. Near fine in a fine dust jacket.
75. DELILLO, Don. The Body Artist. NY: Scribner (2001). A novella. Signed by the author on the front flyleaf, as opposed to a number of copies of this title that were issued with the author's signature on a tipped-in leaf. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
76. -. Same title, the advance reading copy. Fine in wrappers.
77. DENNIS, Geoffrey. Bloody Mary's. NY: Simon & Schuster, 1934. A novel written as an autobiographical account of a young schoolboy in an English boys' school around the turn of the century. Dennis was a highly regarded novelist in England at the time, who has since slipped into obscurity. Joints darkened; near fine in a very good, spine-faded dust jacket with shallow chipping at the crown and a closed edge tear at the lower front flap fold.
78. DILLARD, Annie. The Weasel. Claremont: Rara Avis (1981). An attractive limited edition by a noted small press of a piece Dillard wrote in 1974. One of 190 copies signed by the author. Fine in wrappers and dust jacket.
79. DOCTOROW, E.L. Billy Bathgate. NY: Random House (1989). A novel that was nominated for the National Book Award and which won the William Dean Howells Medal for the best work of fiction in a five year period, as well as the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction and the PEN/Faulkner Award. Signed by Doctorow, and also with a presentation inscription to novelist Robert Stone, "with the deepest appreciation of the PEN/Faulkner board." Fine in a fine dust jacket with the National Book Critics Circle label on the front panel.
80. DONOSO, José. Tres Novelitas Burguesas. Barcelona: Seix Barral (1973). "Three bourgeois novels" by this Chilean writer, one of which was the basis for Luis Buñuel's classic film The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, which won an Oscar for Best Foreign Film. Published in the U.S. as Sacred Families: Three Novellas. Donoso is also noted for his critical study of Latin American literature, which both defined and helped create the boom in Latin American literature that brought an entire new pantheon of South American writers into the forefront of world literature. Inscribed by Donoso. Very good in self-wraps.
81. -. Another copy. Inscribed by the author and signed "Pepe Donoso." Small ink stain to lower foredge; still very good in self-wraps.
82. DOS PASSOS, John. The Garbage Man. NY: Harper & Brothers, 1926. The first edition, one of 1000 copies, in the first issue binding. Faint foxing to flyleaf; else fine, lacking the dust jacket.
83. DOUBIAGO, Sharon. Body & Soul. Mena: Cedar Hill Publications, 2000. A collection of poems, one of which won the author her third Pushcart Prize. Warmly inscribed by Doubiago to another poet, with a drawing of a heart, and dated in the year of publication. Slight splaying to front cover; else fine in wrappers.
84. DOUGLAS, Norman. In the Beginning. NY: John Day (1928). His first novel after the success of South Wind, published 10 years earlier. Pencilled owner name on half title; very near fine in a near fine, spine-tanned dust jacket. An attractive copy of the trade edition of this title.
85. DUBUS, Andre. Land Where My Fathers Died. (n.p.): Stuart Wright (1984). His first limited edition, a single story issued in an edition of 200 copies. Dubus was a contemporary master of the short story form and the most accomplished writer of novellas in the U.S.; he was compared on numerous occasions to Chekhov. Signed by the author. Clothbound, with paper spine label, issued without dust jacket. Covers splaying, as is common with this title; near fine.
86. DUBUS, Andre, III. House of Sand and Fog. NY: Norton (1998). The advance reading copy of the author's highly praised third novel, with glowing blurbs from Tobias Wolff and Larry Brown, among others. A finalist for the National Book Award, an Oprah Winfrey selection, and the basis for an award-winning movie. Tiny nicks to corner and spine; very near fine in wrappers. Together with the advance reading copy of the first Vintage edition. NY: Vintage (2000). Fine in wrappers. For both:
87. DUNCAN, David James. The Brothers K. NY: Doubleday (1992). The uncorrected proof copy of the second novel by the author of the contemporary classic The River Why, which was the first book of fiction ever published by the Sierra Club. The Brothers K is a novel set in the Pacific Northwest, the author's native ground, and it has developed one of the most passionate followings of any American novel in recent history, albeit one that has flown slightly below the overall cultural and critical radar. One reader called it, quite correctly, "a novel about baseball and family dynamics and spiritual awakenings and a quest for grace and redemption" and noted that it was the only book in his library he would not loan out to anyone, instead going out and buying a copy if someone wanted to borrow his. This proof is a very early advance state of the book, shot from hand-corrected manuscript sheets and revealing many changes in the text, excisions (still readable), etc. A glossy advance reading copy of the book was produced and widely distributed, but this is the first copy of the proof we have seen, and it is both uncommon and textually significant. Near fine in wrappers.