Catalog 133, N-O
215. (NABOKOV, Vladimir). FIELD, Andrew. Nabokov. His Life in Part. NY: Viking (1977). A follow-up to Field's earlier book -- Nabokov. His Life in Art. Top edge foxing and fading to cloth there; near fine in a near fine dust jacket with fading to the spine lettering.
216. NAIPAUL, V.S. Half a Life. NY: Knopf, 2001. The uncorrected proof copy of the first American edition of his first novel in six years, published just before he won the Nobel Prize for Literature. Fine in wrappers.
217. NIN, Anaïs. The Four-Chambered Heart. NY: Duell, Sloan and Pearce (1950). The first American edition. Inscribed by the author: "For John Crowe Ransom/ Anaïs Nin/...on these revolving stages/ of our unconscious..." Spine unevenly sunned; very good in a very good dust jacket with mild rubbing, slight edge wear and a small sticker removal abrasion on the front flap. Nin was generous, even profligate perhaps, about signing her books, but one seldom sees such good literary association copies as this one turn up on the market.
218. NIN, Anaïs. Cities of the Interior. Denver: Swallow (1959). The first edition of this massive volume, which collects five of her novels and is illustrated with line engravings by her husband, Ian Hugo. Inscribed by Nin to her therapist: "For Dr. Inge Bogner/ with devotion and/ admiration for your unusual insight and/ sustained objectivity -- / and patience!/ Anaïs Nin." After her celebrated relationship, and dramatic breakup, with the psychiatrist Otto Rank, Nin began seeing Bogner, a New York City psychiatrist whom she continued to see over the next three decades, up until her death. Nin wrote at one point that of all the therapists she had seen, Dr. Bogner was the one who gave her the most insight and help in understanding her own psyche. Spine darkened and creased; very good in white wrappers.
219. NORMAN, Howard. The Wishing Bone Cycle. Santa Barbara: Ross-Erikson (1982). The second edition of this collection of Swampy Cree Indian narrative poems, translated by Norman, with a preface by poet and translator Jerome Rothenberg, founder of Alcheringa. Winner of the Harold Morton Landon Translation Award from the Academy of American Poets. This expanded edition includes Norman's Who Met the Lynx and Why Owls Die with Wings Outspread. Signed by Norman and Rothenberg. Near fine in rubbed wrappers.
220. (NORMAN, Howard). Kuksu, Nos. 4-6. (Nevada City): (Kuksu Press) (1976-1977). Three issues of this "Journal of Back Country Writing," each with a Swampy Cree translation by Norman, and each signed by Norman at his contribution. Foredge and top edge staining; else each is near fine in wrappers. For the three:
221. (NORMAN, Howard). Wch Way 5/New Wilderness Letter 12. (NY/Albany): (New Wilderness Foundation/Double Pelican), 1984. A combined issue of these two periodicals, with a translation by Norman that is signed by the author at his contribution. Spine-creased; minor rubbing; about near fine in wrappers.
222. NORRIS, Frank. The Pit. NY: Doubleday, Page (1903). The second volume in the intended "Epic of the Wheat" trilogy. The first volume, The Octopus, was published in 1901, and in 1902 Norris published an article on corruption in agriculture in Everybody's Magazine entitled "A Deal in Wheat." He died of complications from surgery in 1902 and this volume was published posthumously in 1903. The third volume in the trilogy was never written. Owner name on flyleaf; cocked; spine cloth faded; a good copy, lacking the dust jacket.
223. OATES, Joyce Carol. Last Days. London: Jonathan Cape (1985). The first British edition of this collection of stories. Inscribed by Oates to another National Book-award winning author and his wife in the year of publication. Page edges darkening; else fine in a fine dust jacket. A nice association copy.
224. O'BRIEN, Tim. From How to Tell a True War Story. (n.p.): Minnesota Center for Book Arts, 1987. A broadside excerpt from The Things They Carried, beginning: "You can tell a true war story by the questions you ask." (There was another broadside done in 1992 called "A True War Story" with different text.) One of 150 numbered copies, signed by the author. 10 1/2" x 11". Fine.
225. O'CONNOR, Flannery. The Habit of Being. NY: FSG (1979). Her collected letters, edited and introduced by Sally Fitzgerald. A massive volume, 600+ pages, with letters to virtually every major Southern literary figure, and many others. Cocked; fading to top cloth edges; very good in a very good, spine-faded dust jacket with one edge tear.
226. (O'CONNOR, Flannery). The Spectrum, 1945. Milledgeville: Georgia State College for Women (1945). O'Connor's senior yearbook, for which she served as feature editor and contributed the illustrated endpapers and the cartoons that appear throughout the volume. She is also listed and/or pictured as editor of The Corinthian; art editor of The Colonnade, the campus newspaper; feature editor of The Spectrum; as a member of "Who's Who;" the Newman Club (for Catholic students); the International Relations Club; the Twon Girls' Club, to foster cooperation and sociability between residents and local girls; and as being on the "Y" Cabinet. This copy belonged to a sophomore, and there are many inscriptions to her throughout, including a half dozen written over O'Connor's endpapers. Wear to spine ends; text block a bit loose; still about near fine. O'Connor worked on the yearbook prior to her senior year, but this is the one to which she contributed the most, primarily in terms of her artwork; her work as "feature editor" of the yearbook is unspecified. A very early appearance in print of anything by the author of Wise Blood and A Good Man is Hard to Find -- two of the books that helped define modern Southern literature in the postwar era.
227. O'CONNOR, Frank. Kings, Lords, & Commons. NY: Knopf, 1959. Irish poetry across twelve centuries, translated and introduced by O'Connor. Fine in a very good, spine and edge-sunned dust jacket with rubbing at the folds.
228. O'CONNOR, Frank. The Lonely Voice. Cleveland: World (1963). Nonfiction, a study of the short story by one of the masters of the form. Near fine in a very good dust jacket with a small amount of insect damage to the foredge of the cloth and the lower front flap fold.
229. OLDENBURG, Claes. Injun & Other Histories (1960). NY: Great Bear, 1966. Four short prose pieces by Oldenburg with two illustrations by him. Signed by the author on the front cover, with the signature incorporated into a sketch of a moving figure. Near fine in stapled wrappers.
230. OLSEN, Tillie. Tell Me a Riddle. Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1961. The simultaneous wrappered edition of her first book, a highly praised collection of stories that later came to be one of the key works in the renaissance of women's writing that accompanied the feminist movement in the late 1960s and 1970s. Olsen has been widely seen as one of the most important American women writers of the postwar era, and her relatively small body of work has had a disproportionate influence both because of its quality and because of the political reality that there has been so little of it, largely due to the societal double standard imposed on women, who have been expected to subsume their careers, literary or otherwise, to the demands of raising a family, keeping house, etc. Olsen began writing in the 1930s but didn't publish a book for nearly thirty years because of the demands of economic survival. The title story of this collection won the O. Henry Award for the best story published the year it came out and later became one of the most widely taught and anthologized stories of the modern canon. Spine-faded and edge-darkened; very good.
231. OLSON, Charles. Call Me Ishmael. NY: Grove Press (1947)[1958]. The limited edition of his long essay on the meaning of Melville's Moby Dick, which was first published in 1947 and then reissued by Grove Press in the late 1950s, after Olson's tenure at Black Mountain. Olson was one of the leading figures in the literary avant garde that arose out of Black Mountain College -- one of the most influential cultural centers of postwar America -- where he was an instructor and rector from 1951 until 1956, when it closed. One of 100 numbered copies, this being copy #8 and sporting an inauthentic Olson signature (inked through) on the title page. Ownership signature of another author on front flyleaf. Erasure to colophon; edge-sunning to boards; near fine, without dust jacket.
232. OLSON, Charles. Mayan Letters. (Palma de Mallorca): Divers Press (1954). Olson's letters to Robert Creeley written while Olson was in the Yucatan. One of approximately 600 copies, published by Creeley's Divers Press, in French-folded wrappers. Remarkably, this book, in which the letters only hint at the extent to which Olson's experiences and discoveries were shoring up his hypothesis that the escape from "the too-simple westernisms of a 'greek culture'" lay at least partly in a "repossess[ing] ... of the Indian past" of America, is virtually the entire written record of that period, at least insofar as he directly refers to the Mayans and his belief that their sculpture and art provided a kind of "concrete poetry" whose rules were very different from those of Western art, and whose form therefore contained implicit lessons for us, if we could but read them. The last line of the last letter perhaps sums up some of the frustrations he felt: "The trouble is, it is very difficult, to be both a poet and, an historian." A provocative and revealing book by this important member of the avant-garde Black Mountain community. Text block detached; spine section of wrapper absent; lower rear flap laid in. A good copy only. With the ownership signature of author Howard Norman.
233. -. Another copy. Rebound with the front cover pictorial title block glued in place and the rear wrapper missing; spine tape mended. A fair copy, with a forged signature of the author inked through.
234. OLSON, Charles. The Maximus Poems 11-22. Stuttgart: Jonathan Williams, 1956. The Patrons Edition of the second volume of one of the most important poetic achievements of American poetry in the postwar era. Olson was influential on an entire generation of poets by virtue of his Black Mountain College in the Fifties, and The Maximus Poems are his major poetic work. Published as Jargon 9; folio volume in wrappers (there was no hardcover issue of the first edition; the first hardcover appeared, in a reduced format, in 1960). One of 25 copies. Signed by Olson. Light corner bumps; small chip to heel; very near fine. A very nice copy of the scarcest issue of Olson's most important work
235. OLSON, Charles. Additions. (Buffalo): (Institute of Further Studies), 1968. A single poem, on 6" x 8" stationery, folded once into an Institute of Further Studies envelope. The Institute of Further Studies was responsible for publishing a series of volumes that Olson had conceptualized as "A Curriculum of the Soul" -- work that continued after Olson died. Poem fine; envelope near fine and with the signature of author Howard Norman.
236. ONDAATJE, Michael. The Concessions. Blyth: (n.p.), Summer 1981-2. Broadside poem, illustrated with a photograph on map collage. Printed in brown on tan. Signed by the author. 16 1/2" x 23". Rolled; else fine. Uncommon.
237. O'NEILL, Eugene. Strange Interlude. NY: Boni & Liveright (1928). The first trade edition of the third of the Nobel Prize winner's four Pulitzer Prize-winning plays. Spine gilt very slightly dulled; one light corner tap; a very near fine copy in a fine dust jacket. A beautiful example of the bright pictorial dust jacket, seldom found in this condition.