Catalog 132, S-U
243. SALINGER, J.D. Twenty-Two Stories. (n.p.): (Train Bridge Recluse) (1998). First thus, a one-volume piracy collecting the 22 Salinger stories that first appeared together in the two-volume piracy The Complete Uncollected Short Stories in 1974. (Actually, only the later issues carried 22 stories; the first issue lacked "Go See Eddie.") Plain blue wrappers and with a wraparound band listing the contents. Fine. The first piracy was actively suppressed by Salinger's lawyers, and this one has also come under fire from his legal staff. Such editions are the only way to collect, and read, Salinger's uncollected stories other than searching out the 22 different periodicals in which they first appeared.
244. SEBALD, W.G. Die Ausgewanderten. Frankfurt am Main: Eichborn Verlag, 1992. The true first edition of what became the author's first book to be translated into English, as The Emigrants, in 1996. Lower corners tapped; else fine in a printed cardstock sleeve without dust jacket, as issued. With the publisher's promotional flyer and prospectus laid in.
245. SETTLE, Mary Lee. Blood Tie. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1977. Her National Book Award winner which, unlike her many historical novels -- most especially the Beulah Quintet, praised as one of the finest series of historical novels in American literature -- is a contemporary story set on a remote Turkish island. Fine in a very near fine dust jacket with a short split at the excessively scored front flap.
246. SINGER, Isaac Bashevis. A Crown of Feathers. NY: FSG (1973). A collection of stories by the Nobel Prize-winning author. Winner of the National Book Award. Fine in a near fine dust jacket with three short edge tears and minor wear to the spine ends.
247. SMILEY, Jane. Barn Blind. NY: Harper & Row (1980). The first book by the highly-regarded author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning A Thousand Acres. This copy belonged to the author Robb Forman Dew -- who provided dust jacket blurbs for Smiley's next two books -- and bears her ownership signature. A little dampstaining to lower spine and foxing to top edge; near fine in a very good, dampstained dust jacket with light chipping at the crown. A nice association copy, albeit not a presentation copy.
248. SMILEY, Jane. The Age of Grief. NY: Knopf, 1987. Her fourth book, a collection of stories and a novella that sold fewer than 6000 copies. Two of the stories were O. Henry prize winners and one story, the title story, was the basis for the well-received film, The Secret Lives of Dentists, which won two awards from the New York Film Critics Circle. Signed by the author. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
249. SMILEY, Jane. Can Mothers Think? St. Paul: Graywolf Press, 1993. A separate appearance of the text of a talk given by Smiley at the Aspen Writers' Conference and collected in the anthology The True Subject: Writers on Life and Craft. Fine in stapled wrappers. A little-known Smiley "A" item.
250. -. Another copy. Signed by the author. Fine.
251. SNYDER, Gary. Nanao Knows. [San Francisco]: [Four Seasons], 1964. A broadside poem, 9 1/2" x 12 1/2", reproducing Snyder's calligraphy and alluding to Nanao Sakaki, Japanese poet and one of Snyder's mentors, as well as being called "the godfather of Japanese hippies." One of 300 copies sold on the occasion of a reading by Snyder, Lew Welch and Philip Whalen at Longshoreman's Hall in San Francisco on June 12, 1964. McNeil A7. Signed by the author. A fine copy of this early Snyder piece.
252. SONTAG, Susan. Typescript of "Proust Our Contemporary." Undated. An essay on Proust. Six pages, ribbon-copy, with corrections in two hands, one of them Sontag's. Numerous changes to the text visible, both additions and deletions. Fine. Sontag's literary archive has been institutionalized, and manuscript material by her seldom appears on the market.
253. SONTAG, Susan. In America. NY: FSG (2000). A novel, her fourth, among numerous highly praised works of nonfiction. Winner of the National Book Award. Signed by the author. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
254. STEGNER, Wallace. The Spectator Bird. Garden City: Doubleday, 1976. The first trade edition of this novel by the author who was the most ardent advocate of the literature of the American West, and became a mentor to an entire generation of young writers who were responsible for removing the "regional" label from western literature. Winner of the National Book Award. Signed by the author. Fine in a near fine dust jacket with some light wear to the corners and crown. A nice copy of a cheaply made book.
255. STEINBECK, John. Cup of Gold. NY: McBride, 1929. First edition of Steinbeck's very scarce first novel, a romantic historical novel based on the life of the pirate Henry Morgan, whose ship dominated the seas in the 1670s. Only 1537 copies were printed, and most failed to sell; the remaindered sheets were bound up in 1936 by Covici Friede, then Steinbeck's publisher, after the author had achieved a certain amount of literary and commercial success. Cup of Gold was marketed as a boy's adventure story, and the author eventually regretted writing it; his later fiction concentrated on more realistic settings and people, and a more natural style. This is the issue with the top edge unstained (no priority indicated). Some mottling to rear cover and rear endpapers; slight fading to spine. A very good copy, lacking the rare dust jacket.
256. STONE, Robert. Dog Soldiers. Boston: Houghton Mifflin (1974). His second novel, winner of the National Book Award and one of the best novels to link the impact of the Vietnam war on American society in the Sixties to the dark side of that era -- the official corruption and the underside of the drug experiences of a generation. Basis for the Karel Reisz film, Who'll Stop the Rain, which was nominated for the Golden Palm at Cannes, and was also actor Nick Nolte's breakout film. Nolte played Ray Hicks, an ex-Marine based in part on Neal Cassady, Jack Kerouac's sidekick in On the Road, whom Stone knew during his time in California as a part of the group of people hanging out with Ken Kesey on Perry Lane in Palo Alto. Kesey has called Stone, affectionately, "a professional paranoid," in part because of the kinds of views reflected in this novel -- i.e., a less-than-rosy view of the full implications of the counterculture and the drug use that was common at the time. A fine copy in a fine dust jacket but for the orange-toned offsetting on the jacket flaps from the endpages.
257. (STONE, Robert). CRANE, Stephen. The Red Badge of Courage. (NY): Vintage (1990). A short, moving introduction by Stone to this edition, which succinctly places Crane's achievement in its proper context, as an extraordinary feat of the imagination, of literature, and of courage rather than, as it is often viewed, a novel that is notable primarily for its strictly realistic description of the horrors of the American Civil War. Only issued in wrappers. Fine. Signed by Stone.
258. (STONE, Robert). ...When We Talk About Raymond Carver. (Layton): (Peregrine Smith) (1991). A collection of conversations about Raymond Carver, edited by Sam Halpert. Contributors include Robert Stone, Richard Ford, William Kittredge, Tobias Wolff, Geoffrey Wolff, Jay McInerney, Chuck Kinder, Leonard Michaels, Douglas Unger, and Carver's first wife, Maryann Carver. This copy is signed by Stone. Slight bump to spine base; else fine in a fine dust jacket.
259. STYRON, William. Sophie's Choice. NY: Random House (1979). His fifth novel, winner of the National Book Award and the basis for an Oscar-winning movie. A Burgess 99 title. Signed by the author. Very near fine in a very good, lightly spine-faded dust jacket with one edge tear and some dampstaining at the spine base, mostly visible on verso.
260. TAYLOR, Peter. Eudora Welty. (n.p.): Stuart Wright, 1984. An offprint from the limited edition Eudora Welty: A Tribute. One of five numbered copies signed by Taylor, this being copy number 2. In a few brief anecdotes, Taylor recounts his meeting Welty and their subsequent friendship. Fine in wrappers. A very scarce item, linking two of the preeminent Southern authors of the 20th century.
261. THOMPSON, Hunter S. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. NY: Random House (1971). Thompson's hilarious, drug-saturated memoir of a trip to Vegas -- the book that defined "gonzo journalism." Illustrated by Ralph Steadman, with his bizarre and unforgettable ink drawings, the perfect complement to Thompson's bizarre and unforgettable prose. Boards a bit edge-sunned, as is usual for this title; foxing and spotting to page edges; near fine in a near fine dust jacket.
With Thompson's Corrections
262. THOMPSON, Hunter S. Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72. (San Francisco): Straight Arrow Books (1973). Thompson covers the Nixon/McGovern race for the Presidency in his own inimitable style. This is the first printing, in the first issue dust jacket, and has Thompson's own hand-written corrections for the third printing. On the first prelim, Thompson details desired corrections for three pages of text; he makes two corrections to the table of contents; he requests a byline on page 171; and he deletes the graphic on page 512. With a Ralph Steadman caricature of Thompson, also on the first prelim, signed by Steadman. Foredge stain; near fine in a very good, price-clipped dust jacket with creased edge tears. Together with a laminated copy of a 1973 letter Thompson wrote to Frank Mankiewicz in which he refers to "422 other major corrections" he's been trying to get made since the galleys came back. In custom clamshell case. A unique copy of one of Thompson's key books, which applied his brand of incendiary participatory journalism to a major public event, setting the stage for others -- most recently including filmmaker Michael Moore -- to follow.
263. THOMPSON, Hunter S. and STEADMAN, Ralph. The Curse of Lono. NY: Bantam (1983). An advance review copy of this book with text by Thompson and illustrations by Steadman, in which the pair are sent to cover the Honolulu marathon for Running magazine. Signed by Thompson and with an original full-page color drawing of Thompson signed by Steadman. Only issued in wrappers. Very near fine, with press release and author photo laid in. In custom clamshell case. Scarce signed, and also scarce as an advance copy; we've never seen another copy signed by Thompson and Steadman, nor a review copy, let alone both together.
264. THOMPSON, Hunter S. and STEADMAN, Ralph. Gonzo: The Art. NY: Harcourt Brace (1998). A lavish book of three decades of Steadman's artwork, introduced by Thompson. Signed by Steadman and Thompson and then shot twice by Thompson at close range. One of two copies shot by Thompson, with a photograph of the shooting laid in, on the verso of which Thompson has written ".44 S&W mag./close." Additionally, Thompson has added the sentiment "Screw you Suckfish" to his introduction and stamped the words "Sexually Explicit Material" there. Quarto; bullet holes, else fine in a fine dust jacket. Housed in a custom clamshell box lined with collages made of Steadman's drawing board backing paper, and signed and dated by Steadman. An elaborate production and, by its nature, a unique one.
265. (THOMPSON, Hunter S. and STEADMAN, Ralph). KAYE, John. Where the Buffalo Roam. Universal City: Universal Studios, 1979. "Final Draft" of the screenplay for this movie based on "the twisted legend of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson." Lavishly inscribed by Ralph Steadman. The draft is dated May 23, 1979; multi-colored revision pages bound in, with varying dates through June 28; bradbound in cardstock covers. Fine. Original scripts like this are produced in small quantities, primarily for those working on the film. This copy, by virtue of its Steadman drawing, is unique.
266. (THOMPSON, Hunter S.). PERRY, Paul. Fear and Loathing: The Strange and Terrible Saga of Hunter S. Thompson. NY: Thunder's Mouth Press (1992). An unauthorized biography, featuring dust jacket art by Ralph Steadman. This is one of 20 numbered copies signed by Steadman. Fine in a fine dust jacket.
267. TOLKIEN, J.R.R. The Hobbit. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1938. The first American edition of Tolkien's landmark book, the second issue, with the Houghton Mifflin logo on the title page, rather than the "bowing hobbit," to which Tolkien reportedly objected, and the position of the endpaper maps matching their listing in the table of contents. The two issues of the first American edition totaled 5000 copies. A fine copy, lacking the dust jacket. In custom clamshell case.
Complete
268. TOLKIEN, J.R.R. The History of Middle Earth, Volumes 1-12, and The Silmarillion. London: Allen & Unwin/Unwin Hyman/Harper Collins, 1977, 1983-1996. A complete set of the first editions of these poems, tales and songs that underlay Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Hobbit. Tolkien began writing these tales while in college, 40 years before LOTR was published. Tolkien was a student of philology, the study of historical linguistics and the rules by which languages evolve, and in these stories he invented archaic languages and the stories told in those languages, and then tracked the evolution of both the stories and the language until they became the legends and mythology that informed Middle Earth. This attention to the actual process of the historical evolution of languages, and the way that the tales' history is embodied in linguistic evolution itself, is part of what gives the Trilogy its powerful sense of reality and immediacy: the characters are embedded in a historical context that is most often implicit, not explicit, just as our own historical context is. But long before the Lord of the Rings was on Tolkien's horizon, he wrote these tales with an eye toward the way myth and legend live and change over time; the stories are compelling in and of themselves, beyond the degree to which they inform his unquestioned masterpiece. They are also the reason that his masterpiece has withstood the test of time so far, and will likely continue to do so: the stories take place on a canvas whose scale is the broad sweep of human and linguistic history, and they are not bound to a particular time and place. In particular, these stories, most of them written between 1913 and the early 1940s, give the lie to the simplistic notion that Tolkien's trilogy is a mere analogue for the conflicts involved in World War II. If anything, it was the First World War -- with its senseless, mechanized destruction on a heretofore unimaginable scale -- that influenced Tolkien in his view that battle between the forces of good and evil was not a struggle of ideologies so much as one between a world view in harmony with nature and one that focused on unchecked industrial development. Volume 3 has a very slight lamination wrinkle, virtually unnoticeable; otherwise a fine set in fine, unclipped dust jackets. The Silmarillion and Volumes 1, 2 and 4 have no printed prices, as issued: Volume 1 has had a price sticker removed; Volume 4 has an A&U price sticker. Volumes 10 and 11 have no prices on the flaps, i.e., the export edition dust jackets (which, by the usual standards of the publication process, probably preceded those with printed prices). Published over the course of more than a dozen years, complete sets are very difficult to assemble as all of the volumes had small first printings, and some were positively tiny -- 1500 copies or so.
269. (TOMLINSON, Charles). Poems. London: Oxford University Press, 1964. Poetry by Tomlinson, Austin Clarke and Tony Connor. Inscribed by Tomlinson. Handmade bookplate of another poet on front flyleaf. Rebound; near fine.
270. TYLER, Anne. Your Place is Empty. Concord: William B. Ewert, 1992. A story that originally appeared in The New Yorker. Of a total edition of 100 copies, this is one of 40 hardbound copies signed by the author. Fine in a fine glassine dust jacket. One of the few signed limited editions by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author and by far her scarcest "A" item.
271. UPDIKE, John. Rabbit, Run. NY: Knopf, 1960. A review copy of Updike's second novel, which introduced Rabbit Angstrom and began the sequence of novels that will likely stand as his major work, a four-volume series spanning 30+ years. The chronicle of Rabbit Angstrom is a chronicle of America in the postwar era, and Updike has become without question -- in large part on the basis of this series -- the most collected living American author. Small owner label on flyleaf, and a quote from the book transcribed in pencil on the rear free endpaper; slight dampening to top stain and lower spine; still near fine in a very good dust jacket with wear to the folds and dampstaining that is mostly visible on the verso. A quite attractive copy of this book, with little of the jacket wear or fading that one commonly encounters. $1250
272. UPDIKE, John. The Centaur. NY: Knopf, 1963. His sixth book and fifth work of fiction, a novel that was his first National Book Award winner. Fine in a near fine dust jacket with a bit of black added to the spine ends.
273. UPDIKE, John. Six Poems. (n.p.): Aloe, 1973. One of the earlier and scarcer of his limited editions, having had a small printing and been done at a time before he was especially widely collected. Of a total edition of 126 copies, this is one of 26 lettered copies signed by the author. Faint, thin strip of fading along the top edge of the front cover, otherwise fine in saddle-stitched self wrappers.
274. (UPDIKE, John). "The Fisherman and His Wife" in The Texas Arts Journal, No. 1. (Dallas): (Cameron Northouse) (1977). Updike's libretto for a children's opera based on a Grimm fairy tale and first performed by the Boston Opera Company at the Savoy Theater in May, 1970. Other contributors to the journal include James Purdy, George Garrett and William Saroyan. Quarto. Small corner chip rear cover; else near fine in wrappers.
275. -. Another copy. Signed by Updike and George Garrett. Slight overall dust soiling; near fine in wrappers.
276. -. Same title, the "manuscript edition." One of 22 copies with a page of typescript signed by Updike laid into a separate folder. Slight crown bump to journal; else fine in wrappers, in fine slipcase.
277. (UPDIKE, John). "Loving the Sox" and "Sonnet to Human Grandeur" in Lord John 10. Northridge: Lord John Press, 1988. An impressive anthology celebrating ten years of the Press's existence, collecting pieces by twenty-six contributors written expressly for this volume. Including, and signed by, Updike, Jim Harrison, Raymond Carver, James Crumley, Ray Bradbury, William Everson, Tess Gallagher, Joyce Carol Oates, James Purdy, Derek Walcott, former President Gerald Ford, and many others. This is the deluxe edition, one of 75 copies quarterbound in leather. A tiny bit of shelf wear to the corners of the spine, otherwise fine, without dust jacket, as issued.
278. (UPDIKE, John). WHARTON, Edith. The Age of Innocence. NY: Ivy Classics (1996). First thus, a paperback reprint of Wharton's 1920 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. With a new 8-page introduction by John Updike. Spine creased from reading; very good.