Catalog 132, N-R
208. NICHOLS, John. The Milagro Beanfield War. NY: Holt Rinehart Winston (1974). His third book and most well-known, the first in his New Mexico Trilogy, one of the classics of contemporary Western literature. Basis for a well-received movie that was produced and directed by Robert Redford. Fine in a fine dust jacket. A beautiful copy of a book that seldom turns up in such condition.
209. NORDAN, Lewis. Welcome to the Arrow-Catcher Fair. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1983. The scarce hardcover issue of his first book, a collection of stories that was issued simultaneously in hardcover and softcover. The stories' locales are in the rural South; the book was published as part of the Press's commitment to literary fiction from the South, which brought out books by James Lee Burke as well as John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy of Dunces. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
210. OATES, Joyce Carol. Them. NY: Vanguard (1969). The sixth book, fourth novel, by this prolific author. This title won the National Book Award. Trace edge-sunning to cloth; still fine in a near fine dust jacket with one short edge tear, fading to the spine lettering, and mild rubbing to the spine extremities. A very nice copy of a book that tends to show wear readily.
211. O'BRIEN, Tim. If I Die in a Combat Zone. (n.p.): Delacorte Press (1973). His first book, a highly praised memoir of the Vietnam war in which O'Brien uses some of the techniques of fiction to convey the experience of Vietnam from the grunt's perspective with immediacy and power. Inscribed by the author to a former high school classmate and neighbor, who was also a debate partner with O'Brien in high school: "To Jim,/ Best wishes -- / memories of old Worthington Sr. High!!/ Regards/ Tim." Foxing to page edges; rebound in black leather with gold stamping on spine; slightly cocked; near fine.
212. -. Another copy. Inscribed by the author to the parents of a high school classmate and neighbor and signed "Tim." Very slight edge-sunning to upper boards; else fine in a near fine dust jacket with a few tiny edge tears.
213. O'BRIEN, Tim. Going After Cacciato. (NY): Delacorte Press (1978). His third book, a magical realist novel about a recruit who decides to walk away from the Vietnam war and go to Paris overland. Winner of the National Book Award and one of the literary classics of the war. Signed by the author. One slight corner tap; still fine a fine dust jacket with one tiny nick to the spine base.
214. -. Same title. Second printing. Inscribed by the author to a high school friend and classmate. Mottling to cloth and heavy foxing to page edges; very good in a near fine dust jacket with darkened flaps and some edge creasing.
215. O'BRIEN, Tim. A True War Story. Berkeley: Black Oak Books/Okeanos Press, 1992. A powerful broadside excerpt from The Things They Carried, which begins, "Twenty years later, I can still see the sunlight on Lemon's face..." There was another broadside done in 1987 called "From How to Tell A True War Story" with different text. 8" x 12 3/4". Although not called for, this copy is signed by the author. Fine.
216. O'CONNOR, Flannery. The Complete Stories. NY: FSG (1971). The posthumously collected stories of the writer who redefined the Southern grotesque tradition in the postwar years, with its particular blend of eccentric characters, religiosity, humor and terror. Includes all the stories from her two collections, A Good Man is Hard to Find and Everything That Rises Must Converge, as well as twelve previously uncollected stories. Winner of the National Book Award. Fine in a near fine, very slightly spine-tanned dust jacket.
217. (O'CONNOR, Flannery). A Memoir of Mary Ann. NY: Farrar Straus Cudahy (1961). A memoir of a severely ill child, purportedly by the Dominican nuns who took care of her at their home for cancer patients in Atlanta. Introduction by Flannery O'Connor, and the consensus today is that O'Connor ghost-wrote the entire volume, based on the stories the individual nuns told her. Signed by O'Connor at her introduction and an inscription "Regards to Carol [from the] Srs of St Dominic" on front flyleaf. The recipient was a young girl from a local Catholic junior high school, who visited the home with her class and listened to O'Connor give a reading from the book, shortly after its publication. This is the thin issue with blue top stain; no priority determined. Foxing to endpages and foredge; near fine in a near fine dust jacket with trace wear at the spine ends. O'Connor's signature is very scarce; she died in 1964 at the age of 39, and had been ill with lupus for most of her adult life, becoming increasingly debilitated as she got older. This is only the second signed copy of this title we have seen, both of which probably date to the same class visit to Our Lady of Perpetual Help Home in Atlanta, in 1961.
218. O'HARA, John. Hope of Heaven. NY: Harcourt, Brace (1938). The fourth book, third novel, by the author of Appointment in Samarra and Butterfield 8, among others. This is a novel of Hollywood, which was a departure for O'Hara: much of his fiction took place in the fictional town of Gibbsville, Pennsylvania -- an analogue for the author's home of Pottsville, PA. Near fine in a near fine dust jacket with very light edge wear. A very attractive copy of one of O'Hara's scarcest books.
219. O'HARA, John. Files on Parade. NY: Harcourt, Brace (1939). His fifth book, a collection of stories, and another of the author's scarcer titles, and again a very nice copy; fine in a near fine dust jacket.
220. O'HARA, John. Ten North Frederick. NY: Random House (1955). A novel set in the fictional town of Pottsville, PA, the locale of much of the author's fiction. Winner of the National Book Award. Fine in a fine dust jacket with trace rubbing to the spine crown. A very nice copy.
221. OUSPENSKY, P.D. The Symbolism of the Tarot. St. Petersburg, Russia: (n.p.), 1913. An essay on the Tarot by one of the most prominent metaphysical thinkers of the early part of the 20th century. Ouspensky wrote Tertium Organum: A Key to the Enigmas of the World in 1912, essentially a psychological handbook to higher consciousness. In 1915 he became a student of G.I. Gurdjieff, and he later moved to England and spent much of the rest of his life promoting and explicating Gurdjieff's ideas on spirituality, consciousness and evolution. This short volume attempts to integrate the Tarot in a mystical tradition that embraces alchemy, the Kabbalah, and other streams of metaphysical thought through the ages. Front cover detached and edge-soiled; rear cover absent and rear page (blank) chipping from stapled spine as well. Otherwise a very good copy of a scarce volume, published in Russia just prior to the outbreak of World War I and before the Bolshevik Revolution.
222. PATCHEN, Kenneth. Fables and Other Little Tales. Baden: Jonathan Williams, 1953. Poet John Ciardi's copy, with Ciardi's ownership signature and address stamp and with a few underlinings and marginal notations in the early part of the text, presumably Ciardi's. This is the issue in wrappers, not identified by the bibliographer, and one of 450 copies. With a plain bookmark laid in from the Saturday Review, where Ciardi worked as poetry editor. Near fine in self-wrappers.
223. PELECANOS, George P. A Firing Offense. NY: St. Martin's (1992). His first book, a hardboiled mystery novel featuring Nick Stefanos. Signed by the author. Fine in a fine dust jacket. One of the important debuts in the mystery genre in the 1990s; Pelecanos' books have received high critical praise for their grittiness and realistic sense of place -- the neighborhoods of Washington, DC, far from the corridors of political power -- and have become bestsellers upon publication.
224. -. Another copy. Signed by the author. Fine in a near fine dust jacket with light rubbing to the edges and folds.
225. -. Another copy. Signed by the author. Fine in a near fine dust jacket with two edge tears on the rear panel.
226. PERCY, Walker. The Moviegoer. NY: Knopf, 1961. A review copy of his first book, winner of the National Book Award and a novel that helped establish Percy as both an important Southern writer and as a chronicler of the spiritual malaise of modern America. The Linda Hobson bibliography gives the first printing as 1500 copies although we have been told that it was more, perhaps as many as 3000; in either case, by today's standards -- or even by the standards of the time -- the first printing was tiny and, needless to say, the number of review copies sent out would number a few dozen, perhaps. A hint of edge-darkening to boards; still fine in a very near fine dust jacket with just a bit of shallow edge creasing. A beautiful copy of an important, award-winning first book, which is scarce in fine condition and exceptionally so as an advance copy.
227. POWERS, J.F. Morte D'Urban. Garden City: Doubleday, 1962. His third book and first novel, winner of the National Book Award. A hint of foxing to pastedowns; else fine in a very near fine dust jacket with a couple tiny creases on the spine.
228. PRICE, Reynolds. A Generous Man. NY: Atheneum, 1966. Third book, second novel by this North Carolina writer. Faint dampstaining to lower corner; near fine in a very good dust jacket with slight rubbing and some dampstaining that is mostly visible on verso.
229. PRICE, Reynolds. Real Copies. (Rocky Mount): North Carolina Wesleyan College Press (1988). One of 531 copies of the "regular" edition of this essay, issued unsigned, although this copy has been signed by the author. Spine faintly sunned, otherwise fine in wrappers.
230. PRICE, Reynolds. The Tongues of Angels. NY: Atheneum, 1990. His eighth novel, set at a summer camp in the Blue Ridge mountains in the 1950s. Signed by the author. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
231. PRICE, Reynolds. The Promise of Rest. NY: Scribner (1995). The third book in his sequence that began with The Surface of Earth and continued with The Source of Light. Signed by the author. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
232. PRICE, Reynolds. The Collected Poems. (NY): Scribner (1997). Collects his first three volumes of poetry in their entirety and prints a new, previously unpublished collection. Signed by the author. Front cover slightly splayed; else fine in a fine dust jacket.
233. PRICE, Reynolds. Roxanna Slade. (NY): Scribner (1998). A novel that, like his award-winning Kate Vaiden, tells the story from the point of view of an elderly southern woman looking back on her life. Signed by the author. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
234. PROULX, E. Annie. The Shipping News. NY: Scribner (1993). Her third work of fiction and second novel, which won both the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize -- a rare literary double. Fine in a fine dust jacket. A beautiful copy of this book, which was made into a not-particularly-successful film, which nonetheless received two Golden Globe nominations.
235. PYNCHON, Thomas. Gravity's Rainbow. NY: Viking (1973). Pynchon's landmark third novel, winner of the National Book Award as well as the William Dean Howells Medal for the best work of fiction by an American over a five-year span. Gravity's Rainbow became the benchmark for postmodern American fiction upon publication and secured its mysterious and reclusive author's place in the postwar American literary pantheon. A fine copy in a very near fine dust jacket with two tiny spots of rubbing to the rear spine fold. Small hardcover first printing of 4000 copies; the balance of the first edition was issued in softcover.
Reagan Typescript on Presidential Aspirations
236. REAGAN, Ronald. "When Did You Stop Wanting to Be President of the United States?" c. 1974. Reagan's typescript answer to this question posed for Harper's "unscientific poll of interested parties," which was published in the March 1975 issue. Ribbon-copy typescript (possibly dictated); one full page; reading, in part: "I never started. Now more than ever, I believe the job must `seek the man.' Aspiration to the Presidency is the stuff of boyhood dreams for a lot of youngsters...but an adult must have another perspective...the man who sets out to acquire the Presidency...may forget that it is the job's symbolic inspiration for the people, not the actual power, that is important...Americans like to be inspired by their Presidents... I am concerned, though. We need to lower our expectations for miracle-working on the part of our Presidents. Ever since F.D.R. appeared to pull of some genuine miracles during the Depression (with delayed flaws he didn't foresee) we have come to expect the President and the federal government to instantly solve just about any human problem that has come along. Governments tend not to solve problems, only rearrange them..." Six years later, Ronald Reagan won the Presidency in a landslide victory over Jimmy Carter. Typed on paper bearing the watermark of the State of California, with a biographical statement that reads, "Ronald Reagan, former Republican Governor of California, is a member of the new presidential commission studying the CIA's alleged misconduct." Unsigned; copyedited in pencil; tiny puncture in the margin and folded, apparently for mailing. Near fine. Letter of provenance provided. Unique.
237. ROTH, Philip. Goodbye, Columbus. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1959. His first book, a collection of short fiction including the title novella -- which was the basis for a well-received movie in the Sixties -- and five short stories. Winner of the Houghton Mifflin Literary Fellowship Award and the National Book Award. Roth's second National Book Award came 35 years later (see below). Trace rubbing to the spine crown; fine in a near fine, spine-tanned dust jacket with internal tape-strengthening to the light wear at the spine extremities and to a few tiny nicks mid-spine.
238. ROTH, Philip. Sabbath's Theater. Boston/NY: Houghton Mifflin, 1995. Winner of the National Book Award, one of the unprecedented string of literary honors Roth has gained over the last decade or so, including two National Book Critics Circle Awards, two PEN/Faulkner Awards, the National Book Award, the Pulitzer Prize, as well as various "life achievement" awards. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
239. ROTH, Philip. His Mistress's Voice. (Lewisburg): Press of Appletree Alley, 1995. A fine press limited edition of a story that first appeared in The Partisan Review in 1986. One of 195 numbered copies, signed by the author. An uncommon edition: although the stated limitation was 195, the press was selling unbound copies a couple of years after the initial publication date, suggesting that not all of the sets of sheets were bound. Fine in quarter leather, burgundy cloth boards, in a fine slipcase. The nicest edition done of one of Roth's works.
240. RUSH, Norman. Mating. NY: Knopf, 1991. His first novel, second book. Winner of the National Book Award. Signed by the author. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
241. RUSHDIE, Salman. The Ground Beneath Her Feet. London: Jonathan Cape (1999). The limited edition of this acclaimed novel by the author of Midnight's Children and The Satanic Verses, among others. One of 150 copies (limitation unspecified) signed by the author. Leatherbound; fine in slipcase. Winner of the Commonwealth Writers Prize.