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Catalog 110, A

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1.ABBEY, Edward. Desert Solitaire. New York: McGraw-Hill (1968). Abbey's first book of nonfiction, which has over the years attained the status of a classic of nature writing, comparable to Rachel Carson's Silent Spring or Aldo Leopold's A Sand County Almanac. Subtitled "A Season in the Wilderness" but actually an account that spans several seasons, this book gives the first and clearest indication of Abbey's love for the natural beauty of the Southwest and his contempt for those who would, out of greed or simple ignorance, despoil it. Inscribed by the author: "____ _ -- / best regards/ Ed A./ Moab Utah 1976." A fine copy in a near fine dust jacket with mild tanning to the spine lettering and slight wear at the extremities. A very nice copy of what may be Abbey's most lasting contribution to the literature of place, and scarce signed or inscribed, especially in nice condition.

2.ABBEY, Edward. Abbey's Road. NY: Dutton (1979). A collection of short nonfiction pieces. One of Abbey's scarcest titles in the hardcover edition, due to its simultaneous publication in wrappers: reportedly no more than 2500 copies of the hardcover were done -- an exceptionally small number for a country the size of the U.S. -- and these were primarily earmarked for libraries, while the much larger softcover edition went to bookstores. This copy is inscribed by the author: "for ____ ____/ -- good luck -- / from his admirer/ Edward Abbey/ New York '79." Fine in a fine dust jacket.

3.ALLISON, Dorothy. Trash. Ithaca: Firebrand (1988). The uncommon hardcover edition of the second book by the author of Bastard Out of Carolina. A collection of stories, winner of two Lambda Awards, published by a small feminist press. Inscribed by the author. Fine without dust jacket, as issued.

4.AMIS, Kingsley. New Maps of Hell. London: Gollancz, 1961. The first British edition of his survey of the science fiction field, chronothematically arranged. Small bookplate front pastedown (H. Bradley Martin, with his 1962 invoice from House of Books still laid in); fine in a near fine dust jacket with very light edge wear and mild spine darkening. A very nice copy of one of the fragile Gollancz hardcovers of that era.

5.ANDERSON, Sherwood. Death in the Woods and Other Stories. NY: Liveright (1933). A collection of short stories -- the author's forte; his style has been cited as having influenced Ernest Hemingway, among others -- which critics have compared favorably to his masterpiece, Winesburg, Ohio. An extremely scarce book in the first edition: this title and Nathanael West's novel, Miss Lonelyhearts, were both at the printer, Van Rees Press, when Horace Liveright declared bankruptcy. Very few copies of either title made their way back to the publisher, and Miss Lonelyhearts is one of the most elusive of 20th century first editions. Similarly, this title seems to have never had any regular trade distribution; copies that have turned up -- and they are few and far between -- seem to have been author's copies, typically the first copies sent out by the publisher. No copies of this title in dust jacket have turned up at auction in at least 20 years, and we have heard of few in private hands. This copy is inscribed by the author. A bit of fading to the spine gilt and sunning to the spine extremities; very near fine in a good, spine-tanned dust jacket with several small chips and closed tears, professionally repaired. An attractive copy of one of Anderson's scarcest, and best, titles.

6.ANGELL, Roger. The Stone Arbor and Other Stories. Boston: Little, Brown (1960). A review copy of Angell's first book, stamped as such on the front flap. With the reviewer's name stamped on the front flyleaf and a few numbers there (pages to cite) and one marginal mark in the text. Angell was the son-in-law of essayist E. B. White, has been a longtime editor at The New Yorker, and is the author of The Summer Game, considered by many to be the best book on baseball ever written. Although he is a fiction editor at The New Yorker, his writing since this first book has been nonfiction. Some sunning to boards and spine; lower corners abraded; near fine in a very good, spine-faded dust jacket with a couple of small chips.

7.(Anthology). Ark II, Moby I. San Francisco: (1956-57). A poetry journal edited by Michael McClure and James Harmon, and including work by Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, Gary Snyder, Robert Duncan, Charles Olson, Denise Levertov, Kenneth Patchen, Kenneth Rexroth, Louis Zukofsky, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Philip Whalen, Richard Eberhart, Robert Creeley and others. Spine- and edge-sunned; otherwise near fine in stapled wrappers. An important early Beat landmark.

8.(Anthology). The Outsider, Vols. 1-3. (New Orleans): (Loujon Press) (1961-1963). The first three issues of this influential little magazine, which published a number of the Beat, and later counterculture, writers while they were still "outsiders." Handset and printed, they were as innovative typographically as they were in terms on contents, and Loujon Press later went on to produce some of the most distinctive productions of the 1960s, an era of great experimentation in book publishing, as in other fields. Contributors include William Burroughs, Gregory Corso, Allen Ginsberg, Kay Boyle, Henry Miller, Leroi Jones, Langston Hughes, Diane Di Prima, Jean Genet, Jack Kerouac, Kenneth Patchen, Gary Snyder, Charles Bukowski and many others. The first two issues have edge-darkened pages from acidification, and the first issue has a small chip missing from the foredge of the last page, not affecting text. Overall, the set is very good in wrappers, and remarkable for its survival in this condition, given the acidity of the paper used.

9.-. Same title. Volume One only. Small bump to spine base; pages nearly free from the effects of acidification. Very near fine in wrappers.

10.(Anthology). The Sounder Few. Athens: U. of Georgia Press (1971). A collection of essays from the Hollins Critic with, in most cases, new afterwords written for this book. Critics include George Garrett, Benedict Kiely, Robert Scholes, and R.H.W. Dillard, who writes on both Colin Wilson and Vladimir Nabokov. This copy bears the ownership signature of Annie Dillard, who was once married to R.H.W. One page corner is turned in the section in which Dillard discusses Nabokov's Ada. A fine copy in a heavily spine-faded dust jacket with a few very small edge chips; about very good.

11.(Anthology). Heart of the Land. NY: Pantheon (1995). An anthology of essays about some of the world's "last great places," published under the auspices of The Nature Conservancy. With a foreword by Barry Lopez. Signed by contributors Rick Bass, Terry Tempest Williams, Jim Harrison and Linda Hogan. Other contributors include Barbara Kingsolver, Paul Theroux, Dorothy Allison, Jim Harrison, Carl Hiaasen, David James Duncan, Annick Smith, Thomas McGuane, Louise Erdrich, William Kittredge, James Welch, Pam Houston and Philip Caputo. Fine in a fine dust jacket.

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