Catalog 162, V-Z
206. (Vietnam). CAPUTO, Philip and YOUNG, John Sacret. A Rumor of War. (n.p.): (CBS), 1979. Part Two of the shooting script of Young's teleplay based on Caputo's novel. Signed by Caputo. Caputo's 1977 novel was one of the first personal accounts of the war to be published after the fall of Saigon and to receive wide distribution: it was both a bestseller in the publisher's edition and a Main Selection of the Book of the Month Club. Caputo recounted his experiences in Vietnam as a Marine, which ended in a court-martial when two of his troops killed two civilians. The television movie, which ran to 3 hours and 20 minutes, was shown in two parts and this is the script for the second part. 107 pages; bradbound in pictorial CBS cardstock covers; near fine. Young's long career included creating, with William Broyles Jr., the Vietnam war television series China Beach and producing and writing many of the episodes of The West Wing. He won a Writers Guild of America award for his work on A Rumor of War and another one for China Beach.
207. (Vietnam). CAPUTO, Philip. Means of Escape. (NY): HarperCollins (1991). His second book of memoirs recounting his experiences in war, including Vietnam; the sequel to his classic, A Rumor of War. Inscribed by Caputo to Robert Stone, who won a National Book Award for his Vietnam novel, Dog Soldiers. Near fine in a fine dust jacket. An excellent association copy.
208. (Vietnam). JUST, Ward. A Dangerous Friend. Boston/NY: Houghton Mifflin, 1999. A novel of Saigon in 1965, in which the protagonist befriends, and betrays, a Frenchman and his American wife living "in country." Laid into this copy is a rejection letter to Just's literary agents from the French publisher Librarie Plon. The letter is folded in thirds; the book has a couple drops of extra glue under the spine cloth (from production) and is otherwise fine in a fine dust jacket. Just's first book, To What End, was nonfiction about the Vietnam war, and he has written about the war or used it as a backdrop for his novels several times. Robert Stone dust jacket blurb extolling the book a "a novel of ideas [that] can break your heart."
209. (Vietnam). Pham Van Don (PVDÔN). [Ba Hô va ....]. 1972. A painting, water color and ink, of "Uncle Ho" -- Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Minh -- among a group of female soldiers who are handing him blossoms from a tree in the background. Painted by Pham Van Don, one of Vietnam's most celebrated artists, signed by him and dated in 1972. Pham Van Don was a graduate of the Fine Arts College of Indochina, and later a professor for many years at the Fine Arts College of Vietnam, in Hanoi. His work frequently has a political subject matter and has won many awards, including prizes at the Salon Unique Fine Arts Exhibition in 1943 and the National Fine Arts Exhibition in 1951, the grand prize at the Intergrafik exhibition in Germany in 1980, and an "A" prize at the "Ten Years of Graphic Arts" show in Hanoi in 1985. His work is in the Vietnam National Fine Arts Museum, the Museum of the Revolution, the Museum of Dien Bien Phu, the People's Army Museum in Vietnam and in several museums in others countries (Germany, Russia, France, Sweden, etc.). 14" x 9 3/4". Fine, matted to 18" x 14". An original, unique work of art by one of Vietnam's greatest painters, celebrating one of the most beloved figures in Vietnamese history, Ho Chi Minh. Fine.
210. (Vietnam). Republic of Vietnam Service. (n.p.: n.p., n.d.). Circular embossed wooden wall hanging depicting the design on the U.S. Army Republic of Vietnam Service medal -- a dragon behind bamboo, above the words "Republic of/ Vietnam/ Service." The design of this medal, which was commissioned in 1965 by Lyndon Johnson, is attributed to Thomas Hudson Jones and Mercedes Lee. It was issued with a red, yellow and green ribbon and this wall hanging uses those colors: red for the dragon; green for the bamboo; and yellow for the background. 14" diameter; a bit of chipping to the border paint; else fine.
211. (Vietnam). WOODS, William Crawford. The Killing Zone. NY: Harper's Magazine Press (1970). The author's first book. Inscribed by Woods to Robert Stone, "the serious man, the samurai." An excellent association copy of this early novel concerned with the use of computer technology in warfare. Sticker removal shadow front flyleaf; fine in a near fine dust jacket.
212. (Vietnamese Propaganda Film). U.S. War Techniques and Genocide in Vietnam. (n.p.): (Vietnam People's Army Film Studio) (1971). 34 minutes. Two reels of 16mm propaganda film prepared in North Vietnam and given to members of a U.S. peace contingent visiting Hanoi in late October 1972, just before the Presidential election that year, in hopes that it would be publicized in the U.S. upon their return. The high-profile entourage of women consisted of Jane Hart, wife of Senator Philip Hart; the poet Denise Levertov; and the novelist Muriel Ruykeyser. They met with the Vietnam Committee for Solidarity with the American People and the Vietnam Women's Union. The U.S. and Vietnam were at the time negotiating a cease-fire -- neither side in especially good faith, as it turns out in retrospect -- and their agreement was due to expire at the end of October unless both sides ratified and signed it by then. Neither did. The Presidential election pitted Richard Nixon, running on a "Peace with Honor" [in Vietnam] theme, against George McGovern, running explicitly as an antiwar candidate. Nixon won 49 states in a landslide. The peace delegation had little but symbolic impact: it reiterated, as had been the case for years, that the bulk of the artistic community in the U.S. was soundly antiwar, and it showed -- as had also been the case for some time -- that the antiwar movement now included part of the mainstream of American life, in this case represented by a moderate Senator's wife. The film is in fine condition in a modestly worn metal film canister. Rare, if not unique.
213. (Vietnamese Propaganda Film). The Culprit is Nixon. 1972. 27 minutes. A single reel of 16mm film, prepared in North Vietnam as propaganda and given to members of a U.S. peace contingent in Hanoi in October, 1972, just before the Presidential election in which Nixon was running for office as the incumbent against George McGovern, the South Dakota Senator and an antiwar candidate. It's safe to imagine that having the North Vietnamese on his side did not especially help McGovern in his campaign for American votes. The high profile delegation included the writers Denise Levertov and Muriel Ruykeyser, and Jane Hart, the wife of then-Senator Philip A. Hart of Michigan. Fine in metal canister. Uncommon, perhaps unique.
214. VONNEGUT, Kurt. Bluebeard. Franklin Center: Franklin Library, 1987. A limited edition of this novel, signed by the author and with a special introduction by him for this edition, in which he decries the broken bond between the artist and the universe that occurs when commerce intervenes. Leatherbound, all edges gilt, with a silk ribbon marker bound in. Fine.
215. VONNEGUT, Kurt. Id omlás (Timequake). Budapest: Magyar Konyvklub (1998). The first Hungarian edition of Vonnegut's final novel. Signed by Vonnegut in the year of publication and further illustrated with a smoking self-caricature on the title page, facing Vonnegut's portrait of Kilgore Trout, which serves as a frontispiece illustration for this edition. The text contains (in the context of the death of John Dillinger) the quote often misattributed to Vonnegut, "If you have a Hungarian for a friend, you don't need an enemy." Fine in pictorial boards, without dust jacket, as issued. In custom slipcase. Probably the only signed Hungarian edition of this title to come on the market, ever, and although Vonnegut was liberal with his self-caricatures, ones that picture him smoking are scarce.
216. WALKER, Alice. Good Night Willie Lee, I'll See You in the Morning. NY: Dial (1978). The uncorrected proof copy of her third poetry collection, and the book preceding her Pulitzer Prize- and National Book Award-winning novel The Color Purple. Cardstock covers bound with a black tape spine, a format that suggests few were created. Slightly dusty with a small rear corner crease; else fine.
217. WARREN, Robert Penn. Blackberry Winter. (Cummington): Cummington Press, 1946. Issued in a total edition of 330 copies, of which 50 Roman numeraled copies were signed by both Warren and the illustrator, Wightman Williams. This is one of 280 numbered copies signed by Williams and by Harry Duncan, the printer, founder of the Cummington Press and later the Abbatoir Press. The list of fine press books printed by Duncan reads like a who's who of American poetry, including Warren, Robert Lowell, William Carlos Williams, Marianne Moore, Allen Tate, James Merrill, Richard Wilbur and many others. Trace rubbing to spine tips; else fine, without the unprinted dust jacket. Uncommon signed by these two.
218. WHITE, E.B. Typed Letter Signed and The Elements of Style. NY: Macmillan (1959). The first edition of the "Strunk and White" Elements of Style, expanded by White from William Strunk Jr.'s 1919 classic, which was first resurrected by White when he wrote a piece in The New Yorker about the textbook he had used at Cornell that was written by Strunk, his friend and teacher. This edition features "A Note on the Book" and "An Introduction" by White, and a final chapter on style by him that replaces a chapter on spelling. This is a complimentary copy, with a "Compliments of the Author" card laid in, that was sent to Edith Oliver, drama critic at The New Yorker. With a typed letter signed "Andy" (White's nickname), on "E.B. White" stationery, written to Oliver, thanking her for her encouragement and explaining that "One thing that tickles me about the little book is that I manage to use the phrase 'the fact that' (p.40) after blasting the daylights out of it in two separate places. ("It should be revised out of every sentence in which it occurs.') Ha." [The fact that White is saying this about his text on page 40 reveals that he had a hand in much more than the introductory remarks and the final chapter.] White then goes on to invite Oliver to his home in North Brooklin, Maine: "There are a thousand things you can do, here, all of them ridiculous." As if in illustration he adds, in a holograph postscript, "The smelts are running. What are you doing in New York when the smelts are running?" The letter is fine, folded, with envelope. The book has Oliver's signature on the front flyleaf and is very near fine, with just trace corner wear, in a very good dust jacket with minor edge wear and a couple tiny corner chips. The Elements of Style, aka "Strunk & White," is perhaps the most widely used book on English-language writing. First printings of it are quite scarce, and a first printing with a letter from White in which he comments on, and makes fun of, his own writing in the book, is exceedingly uncommon, and engagingly humorous. The writer who identified "style" as coming "by way of plainness, simplicity, orderliness, sincerity" suggests that writing itself has a dimension that can almost be described as "moral." A precious copy of a literary treasure.
219. WILBUR, Richard. Advice to a Prophet & Other Poems. NY: Harcourt Brace World (1961). Inscribed by Wilbur to the poet John Holmes and his wife Doris in the year of publication: "To John and Doris/ aff'y/ Dick." Holmes's attractive woodcut bookplate front pastedown; near fine in a very good, edgeworn dust jacket with rubbing to the spine folds. Someone, presumably Holmes, has underlined a few lines in the poem "The Undead." A nice association copy.
220. WOLFE, Tom. The Bonfire of the Vanities. Franklin Center: Franklin Library, 1987. The limited edition of his huge bestselling novel of New York, in which Wolfe tried to prove wrong his own dictum that fiction is dead because it can't live up to the weirdness of everyday life. Leatherbound, all edges gilt, with a ribbon marker bound in. Signed by the author and with a special introduction by him for this edition. Fine.
221. (WOLFE, Tom). The New Journalism. NY: Harper & Row (1973). An anthology of the movement in the 1960s toward a "new journalism" that abandoned pretensions of objectivity in favor of engagement with the subject matter of the writing -- from Terry Southern's humorous pieces to Hunter Thompson's "gonzo" journalism. Includes "The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved" by Thompson; "Khesanh" by Michael Herr, four years before its publication in his Vietnam war classic Dispatches; and "Slouching Towards Bethlehem," the title piece of Joan Didion's landmark 1968 collection. Also includes excerpts from Truman Capote's In Cold Blood and George Plimpton's Paper Lion. Edited by Tom Wolfe, with two pieces by him. First printing (number line in rear of this book); previous owner name; near fine in a near fine dust jacket. New York magazine article by Wolfe laid in.
222. WOOLF, Virginia. Monday or Tuesday. NY: Harcourt Brace, 1921. The first American edition of this early collection of short fiction, in which Woolf explores the stream of consciousness technique that she used to great effect in later novels. One of only 1500 copies, this copy in the black cloth binding. Slight foxing to cloth; near fine in a very near fine, price-clipped dust jacket, professionally, preemptively strengthened on the verso along the folds. A beautiful copy; easily the most attractive one we've seen.
223. WOOLF, Virginia. Flush. A Biography. NY: Harcourt Brace, 1933. The first American edition. A fine copy, with Vanessa Bell endpages, in a very good dust jacket with a few internally tape-mended edge tears, including a small but open tear near the lower front spine fold.
224. YEVTUSHENKO, Yevgeny. Yevtushenko Poems. NY: Dutton, 1966. An early collection by the acclaimed Russian poet, with both the Russian and English text. Inscribed by the author: "To ______/ family/ with one/ condition:/ not to read/ this terrible/ translations [sic]." Small nick to crown; else fine in a near fine, price-clipped dust jacket with rubbing to the edges and folds.