Catalog 163, M
104. MAMET, David. Things Change Medallion, and Autograph Note Signed. 1987. A sterling silver medallion, dated Fall 1987, a year before the film's release, with the title and the two principal cities of the film, Chicago and Tahoe, printed on the perimeter. Of unknown (to us) purpose, but presented by Mamet, with an autograph note signed to a collector: "To ___ - Here is an item I do not think you have - with all best wishes/ David/ 6F95." The medallion is 1 5/8" in diameter, and has two ribbon attachment points on the back (no ribbon present). The note is on the back of Mamet's business card (which states only "David Mamet"), and it has been curled around the medallion, with retained creases. Exceedingly scarce memorabilia of a Mamet film, with a note attesting to its provenance being directly from the author himself.
105. MAMET, David. Boston Marriage. NY: Rosentone Wender Agency, 1998. The bound typescript of Mamet's 1999 play, uncharacteristically focused on female leads, and set at the turn of the 20th century. 137 pages, printed on rectos only, bound in printed yellow cardstock with the Wender Agency address. Inscribed by Mamet in 1999: "To ___. For a loyal friend of the A.R.T. [American Repertory Theater] some merchandise for your loyalty. May it amuse you, provoke your ire, shim up a chair, or start a fire. Love - David." With an additional doodle (of the author wearing an A.R.T. ball cap) and his Mamet stamp, which also appears on the front cover. The script has a printed dated of December 1998, more than six months before the play premiered. The inscription has a date of June 3, 1999, about two weeks before the June 16 premiere at A.R.T. The recipient was on the Advisory Board of the theater and also a major donor to it. A few stains to the front cover, else fine in folding chemise and custom clamshell case. Very uncommon, and a nice association with someone closely involved with the theater where the play debuted.
106. MANTEL, Hilary. Wolf Hall. London: Fourth Estate (2009). The advance reading copy of her first Booker Prize-winning novel. The sequel, Bring Up the Bodies, also won the Booker Prize, making Mantel the third writer (with J.M. Coetzee and Peter Carey) to win the Booker twice, and the first author to win for two books in a series. Wolf Hall also won the National Book Critics Circle Award in the U.S. A massive advance copy, more than 650 pages; this copy has been well-read: cocked, with spine creasing; one small upper corner bump and a shallow corner crease to the front cover. The rear cover has specs for the Australian market. An about very good copy in wrappers. One of the most highly acclaimed novels of recent years, and scarce in any sort of advance issue.
107. MATHESON, Richard. Born of Man and Woman. Philadelphia: Chamberlain Press, 1954. The author's first hardcover publication, a collection of stories with an introduction by Robert Bloch, later the author of Psycho. About 650 copies of this book had been distributed prior to a flood that destroyed the remaining bound copies, and a fire later destroyed the unbound sheets. Inscribed by Matheson to the horror writer Stanley Wiater, in 1992: "To Stanley with many thanks for the excellent interview in Dark Dreamers. Best always, Richard Matheson." Wiater's bookplate on front pastedown. Lower boards show some water damage, text block fine, but still only a good copy in a good, damp-stained dust jacket with effects mostly visible on verso and rear panel. Matheson's career began with placing short stories in the pulp magazines, and he later became one of the most important script writers for "The Twilight Zone." Ray Bradbury has called Matheson "one of the most important writers of the 20th century," and Stephen King cited him as "the author who most influenced me as a writer." A nice association copy.
108. MATHESON, Richard. What Dreams May Come. NY: Putnam's (1978). A novel of the afterlife, which the author called "the most important (read effective) book I've written," because of the way it engaged philosophical, religious and spiritual issues. It represented a move away from the horror genre, with which he was closely associated, to a novel that was more metaphysical and supernatural than his earlier works. Inscribed by Matheson, "with many thanks." Owner's bookplate on front flyleaf; fine in a near fine dust jacket with a modicum of rubbing to the edges and the folds. Laid in is a contemporary newspaper clipping of a Harlan Ellison review of the book.
109. McMURTRY, Larry. Horseman, Pass By. NY: Harper (1961). McMurtry's first book, a breakthrough in Texas literature and in regional literature in general. One of A.C. Greene's "50 Best Books on Texas," and made into the Academy Award-winning movie Hud. Inscribed by the author: "For ___/ My first little effort/ Best/ Larry McMurtry." A fairly early inscription, it would appear, with the signature still legible, and not as stylized as it later became. Fine in a very near fine dust jacket with traces of rubbing but none of the spine fading that is typical of this title. A very nice copy, in a custom slipcase.
110. McMURTRY, Larry. The Last Picture Show. NY: Dial, 1966. His third novel, which fully realized the promise shown by his first two books and firmly established his literary reputation. Basis for the 1971 movie, which launched the careers of several Hollywood notables, including Peter Bogdanovich and Cybill Shepherd, not to mention McMurtry himself, who was nominated for an Oscar for the screenplay and went on to win one almost 30 years later with Diana Ossana for the screenplay of Brokeback Mountain. Front hinge starting, a few spots to top edge; still about near fine in a near fine dust jacket with light edge wear.
111. McMURTRY, Larry. Somebody's Darling. NY: Simon & Schuster (1978). A Hollywood novel by the Oscar-winning screenwriter as well as the author of a number of books that were made into Hollywood films, including The Last Picture Show, Terms of Endearment, Hud (Horseman, Pass By), Lonesome Dove, and several others. Inscribed by the author: "For __- __-__ / In which I take up Hollywood (& incidentally) The Book Trade in friendship/ Larry." A nice inscription. Lower corners tapped, else fine in a near fine dust jacket.
112. McNULTY, John. Third Avenue, New York. Boston: Little, Brown, 1946. The first book by this New Yorker writer, a collection of short pieces from that magazine. McNulty is one of the writers, along with Joseph Mitchell and some others at the New Yorker at that time, who is credited with developing literary journalism as a genre unto itself, distinct from ordinary journalism. Inscribed by McNulty on a tipped-in leaf: "To Kathleen O'Donnell Hoover/ with many thanks for things at Rancho de la Osa/ Sincerely, John McNulty." Hoover was the author of several books in the field of music. Owner name on front endpaper (not Hoover). Near fine in a very good dust jacket with tanning to the rear spine fold and fading to the red spine letters.
113. McPHEE, John. Riding the Boom Extension. Worcester: Metacom, 1983. The first book publication of this piece by perhaps the foremost practitioner of literary journalism today. This piece first appeared in The New Yorker and was eventually reprinted in Table of Contents. Of a total edition of 176 copies, this is copy number 41 of 150 numbered copies, signed by the author. Fine in saddle-stitched marbled paper self-wrappers. Quite scarce these days.
114. MERTON, Thomas. Holy Communion. NY: Harlem Friendship House News, (n.d). c. 1941-1948. A broadside poem by "Tom Merton." Published by the Friendship House, a missionary movement dedicated to interracial justice where Merton volunteered for two weeks in 1941 before journeying to the Abbey of Gethsemani. The Friendship House News became the Catholic Interracialist in 1949, hence the above date range. Fragile and edge-chipped, not affecting text. "Holy Communion" was collected in In the Dark Before Dawn: New Selected Poems of Thomas Merton in 2005, but it is not mentioned at all in Dell'Isola's Thomas Merton: A Bibliography, which was published seven years after Merton's death. We have never seen another copy. OCLC lists only one copy, at SUNY Buffalo, albeit with an incorrect estimated date. Rare.
115. MERTON, Thomas. Boris Pasternak and the People with Watch Chains. (n.p.): (Jubilee)(1959). An offprint from Jubilee of an article Merton wrote on Pasternak following Pasternak's being awarded (and declining) the Nobel Prize for Literature. Oblong quarto; roughly a dozen pages. Mild, even acidification and a few small creases near the spine. Near fine in stapled wrappers. Dell'Isola lists the Jubilee appearance, but makes no mention of this offprint. OCLC locates only three copies.
116. MERTON, Thomas. Typescript for the Preface to God is My Life: the Story of Our Lady at Gethsemani. c. 1960. In 1960, photographer Shirley Burden, who had shot the cover photo for Merton's Selected Poems in 1959, published God is My Life, a photographic study of the Abbey of Gethsemani, where Merton lived. Merton provided this preface, which is far more an extrapolation of the lessons he derived from the book than a mere introduction: "Places, like persons, lose the sense of their own identity. They tend to fabricate for themselves a character, and it is with this unconscious substitute for reality that they go out to meet other men...What a lesson is in this simple fact: Our partial, fabricated self: the self that wants to be at the same time angelic and up to date, is pitifully imaginary...." Four pages, with Merton's holograph corrections, beginning with changing the title to "Preface" from his initial, descriptive title, "A Question of Identity." Four other instances of word changes and a few corrections of spacing, punctuation, or typos. The Christogram "jhs" appears on the first page. Three-holed paper; folded in thirds; near fine. By the following year (if not sooner), Merton had himself taken to photographing the Abbey. Manuscript material by Merton is extremely uncommon in the market, and this is an especially rich example as he reflects on the meaning and beauty of the monastery where he had been living for nearly two decades at that point, so long that until he saw Burden's photographs he no longer even saw the Abbey or recognized its beauty.
117. MILLER, Henry. Tropic of Cancer. NY: Medvsa, 1940. A piracy, and the first American edition, this being the variant in plain magenta wrappers. There were 1000 copies printed of the Medvsa edition of Tropic of Cancer (for which its publisher, Jacob Brussel, went to prison for publishing pornography); in addition, there were between 200 and 500 extra copies which went to New York erotica publisher Samuel Roth and were sold privately by him. The bibliography identified seven binding variants of these overrun copies (although there were probably more). Because they were not part of the contractual agreement between Brussel and Miller, and Miller almost surely received no royalties for them, they are legitimately considered piracies. Wrappers sunned, particularly on the spine, with the title written on the cover and the spine. A near fine copy of a fragile, early variant of one of the literary high spots of the modern era, and its first appearance in the U.S.; it was not published here legally until more than twenty years later.
118. MORRELL, David. First Blood; Rambo/First Blood Part II; Rambo III. NY: M. Evans (1972) and (NY): Jove (1985 and 1988). First editions of all three Rambo books, each inscribed by Morrell. First Blood is inscribed in 1984: "To ___ - at another convention - all warm regards, David Morrell," and dated in Iowa City/Ottawa. Recipient's bookplate front pastedown; near fine in a very good dust jacket with light edge wear and a bit of label residue at the lower spine. Rambo/First Blood Part II is a Jove paperback original, a novelization by Morrell of the screenplay of the movie; inscribed at a convention in Nashville in 1991, "from Rambo's father - David Morrell." Recipient's stamp inside front cover; very near fine. Rambo III is also a Jove paperback original, again a novelization of the screenplay, also inscribed in Nashville in 1991, this one "with warm regards." Remainder stripe lower page edges; near fine. For the set: