Weekly Sale

NY, Collier, (1966). A story-poem for children by the Pulitzer Prize-winning Aiken, illustrated by Julie Maas. This is a "Beginning Reader" book. Minor foxing to boards and jacket: very good in a very good dust jacket. [#035634] $200
$130

1989. A promotional poster for the annual Toronto literary festival, which each year since 1980 has brought together some of the best writers of contemporary world literature. This is one of only a handful of copies signed by all or most of the year's participants, approximately 48 signatures. Signed by: Bharati Mukherjee, Nobuo Kojima, Jamaica Kincaid, Julian Barnes, Gwendolyn Brooks, Susan Fromberg Schaffer, William Jay Smith, Mordecai Richler, Joan Chase, Murray Bail, Deirdre Bair, Alice Wexler, Thomas McGuane, Desmond Hogan, Martin Amis, Hella Haasse, Alice Adams, Norman Sherry, Gabriele Eckart, Hans Joachim Schadlich, Friedrich Christian Delius, Caryl Churchill, W.P. Kinsella, Roy Heath, Nissam Ezekiel, Ruth Rendell, Kjartan Flogstad, Michael Coren, Pia Tafdrup, Louise DeSalvo, Hugo Loetscher, and many others. From the collection of the promoter of the festival, Greg Gatenby. Designed by Annalisa Di Felice and Anita Kunz. 18-1/2" x 25-1/2". Fine. [#029748] $1,000
$700

[March 1988]. Berge, a longtime poet and novelist who was associated with the New York poetry avant-garde of the 1960s, introduces herself to the recipient, the editor of Art & Antiques magazine, as both a writer and an antiques dealer. The letter is a sales pitch for a scarab ring in her possession and includes a drawing: "To me, it looks like either a Scarab beetle (stylized in form), or/and some sort of old inkwell with plumes extending from it. That suits the idea that I'm into Scarabs and I'm also a novelist and writer." Signed by the author. Folded in thirds for mailing, with a resume and mailing envelope included. Fine. [#015470] $40
$20

Tucson, Firsts, 2006. The full year, 10 issues (no issue published in July or August). Articles on Saul Bellow, Charles Bowden, Herman Melville and Nathaniel Philbrick, Charles Portis, Robert Heinlein, Madeleine L'Engle, Nancy Drew, etc. Fine. May require added postage. [#036328] $50
$25

Santa Rosa, Black Sparrow, 2001. Two comb-bound advance copies: one shot from typescript and printed on rectos only, 298 pp.; the second copy is typeset and printed on both sides of the page, 355 pp. Laid into the first copy is an earlier version of one included poem: "oh to be young in 1942!," here titled just "oh, to be young!" The poem is two pages, the first being ribbon copy. Photocopied emendations to the table of contents in the first copy, removing the titles of poems not included; penciled notes to the table of contents in the second copy. The first one has the date "2/3" and the publisher's initials, "JM," on the cover; the second one is also initialed and is dated "4/11." Each is fine with an acetate cover. From the collection of John Martin, publisher of Black Sparrow Press, which printed most of Bukowski's work for the last nearly 30 years of his life, and which was in turn supported by the success Bukowski had with his poetry and his fiction, which rewrote the boundaries of what was acceptable as art. [#033372] $1,250
$938

Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1922. Posthumously published writings by Burroughs on Emerson and Thoreau, as well as on Darwin, and on death. Preface by Clara Barrus, who was Burroughs' companion, biographer, and literary executor. This copy is inscribed by Barrus to Dr. John Johnston, co-author of Visits to Walt Whitman in 1890-1891: "Dr. J. Johnstone - Dear friend, Let this "Last Harvest" of Our Friend come to you as from his hand, and as a souvenir of that happy time when you visited him in his river home. You and W.W. and J.B. found one another out by 'faint indirections,'/ [quoting Whitman] 'And I, when I meet you mean to discover you by the like in you.'/ Clara Barrus/ Woodchuck Lodge/ Roxbury NY/ August 28, 1922." A half-page of notes on the rear endpages, presumably by Johnston, along with penciled underlinings and marginal notations in text. A very good, moderately shelfworn copy, lacking the dust jacket. An excellent association copy. [#035120] $750
$525

(Shelburne), Battered Silicon Dispatch Book, 1999. Inscribed by the author in 2000: "How nice to have the Goose Club here." One slight lower corner tap; else fine in a fine dust jacket. [#029350] $60
$30

NY, Knopf, 1979. Uncorrected proof copy of his second book, a highly praised collection of stories. Laid in are two pages of publisher's promotional material, with review excerpts from Casey's first novel, including a John Irving blurb. Fine in tall wrappers, with a label pasted over bottom edge of pages. [#005033] $60
$30

London, Secker & Warburg, (1983). The first British edition of the first Booker Prize-winning novel by the South African Nobel Prize-winning author. Tap to spine crown; else fine in a fine dust jacket. [#912381] $100
$65

(n.p.), Kitchen Sink, 1970. First printing (no statement of additional printings inside front cover). Near fine. [#036370] $50
$25

(n.p.), Print Mint, 1970. Printing unknown, as the four printings are indistinguishable from each other (according to comixjoint). Near fine. Note: this copy has two identical covers; the protected, underneath one, is fine. [#036371] $50
$25

NY, Macmillan, 1948. Winner of the 1949 John Burroughs Medal. "Bird Experiences in Florida," with text by Helen G. Cruickshank and photographs by the author's husband, Allan D. Cruickshank, who was the official photographer of the National Audubon Society. This copy is signed by both Cruickshanks. Allan has added "Dum Vivimus Vivamus" ("While we live, let us live") below his signature. A fine copy in a very good, unevenly faded, price-clipped dust jacket with moderate edge wear. [#034647] $300
$195

NY, William Morrow, 1965. Winner of the 1966 John Burroughs Medal; a book about the life of herring gulls on an island off the Maine coast. Illustrated with photographs and drawings by Darling, and with a foreword by Roger Tory Peterson, whose recommendation of Louis and Lois Darling to Rachel Carson had resulted in the Darlings illustrating Silent Spring in 1962. An uncommon first edition. Slightly musty; near fine in a very good dust jacket with a couple of small edge chips on the rear panel. [#035124] $125
$81

NY, Dial, 1967. His first book, and his only novel -- a military tale not unlike William Styron's book The Long March -- a story of the peacetime military and the challenges to manhood and honor that its rigid code of morals creates. Dubus was once quoted as saying that after he wrote this novel someone introduced him to Chekhov's short stories, and he threw away the manuscript of what was to be his next novel and began writing short fiction -- of which he became one of our most acclaimed and accomplished practitioners. Dampstaining to lower boards; a very good copy in a very good dust jacket with a small droplet on spine, light corner chipping, and one internally mended edge tear. [#029303] $60
$30

(n.p.), (McSweeney's), (2006). A fundraiser for 826NYC. Thirty-two 9" x 13" reproductions of drawings by Dzama, in a cardstock folder on which is printed an introduction by Sarah Vowell and an interview with Dzama by Vowell. Issued together with a facsimile of one of Dzama's spiral notebooks, filled with text and art. Still shrink-wrapped. Fine. [#032977] $150
$98

NY, Harper & Row, (1976). The simultaneous issue in wrappers. Near fine. David Ignatow blurb. [#036070] $85
$43

[NY], Saturday Evening Post, 1932.

A previously unknown Faulkner "A" item -- an offprint from the March 5, 1932 issue of the Saturday Evening Post.

In long-accepted Faulkner lore, the first and only separate edition of Turn About was the 1939 edition published by W. L. Massiah of Ottawa, Canada, which has been considered Faulkner's scarcest "A" item, with approximately seven known copies. Offered here is a 1932 offprint -- 7 years earlier than the Massiah edition -- with no other known copies.

Faulkner's story "Turn About" was first published in The Saturday Evening Post on March 5, 1932, with two bibliographically significant markers: the second paragraph includes a description of one character as having "a pink-and-white face and blue eyes, and a little dull gold mustache above a mouth like a girl's mouth," and the text is broken up into 10 parts, each identified with a Roman numeral, from I to X.

The earliest book publications of the story -- in O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1932 and in Faulkner's collection Doctor Martino and Other Stories, published in 1934 -- leave out both the "gold mustache" and the text breaks. The former change seems likely to have been authorial, rather than editorial, which means that Faulkner changed the text of the story, removing the "gold mustache" phrase, before the end of 1932, when the O. Henry collection was published. The 1939 Massiah edition includes the phrase, which is how it was concluded that it had been printed from the text of the Post story, rather than from one of the later book publications. The Massiah publication also retains the 10 text breaks, but rather than being identified by Roman numerals, the breaks are separated with a filigree design.

The 1932 offprint offered here includes the "gold mustache" phrase, as well as the 10 text breaks of the original Post publication, with Roman numerals delineating the sections -- the only place, other than in the original magazine itself, where Roman numerals are used in the text.

Carl Petersen, the renowned Faulkner collector, did not have a copy of Massiah's Turn About in his collection when he published his 1975 bibliography. By 1991, when Peter Howard of Serendipity Books published the 643-page catalog of Petersen's Faulkner collection, he did have a copy, which Serendipity valued at $17,500, calling it "by far the rarest of Faulkner's published books." Christie's auction house called the Massiah edition "exceedingly scarce" and noted that "no copies have appeared at auction in at least 50 years" in a 2010 auction listing.

As best we have been able to determine, this 1932 Saturday Evening Post offprint displaces the 1939 edition of Turn About as Faulkner's scarcest "A" item: it is previously unknown, contemporaneous with the initial story publication, and possibly, at this point, one of a kind.

28 stapled pages; one page corner turned; a handful of mostly marginal pencil markings ("x's"); near fine in stapled wrappers.

[#035975] $25,000
$18,750

(n.p.), (n.p.), 1988. A 120-page screenplay by Ford for a 1991 film adaptation that he did from stories in his collection Rock Springs. Signed by Ford. An unknown number of copies were produced, but Ford signed seven of them at a reading in 1990. Photo-reproduced sheets on 3-hole paper. In this copy, page 120 was typed on a different typewriter than the first 119 pages. Bound in a flexible blue binder; fine. The film was directed by Michael Fields and starred Dermot Mulroney, Lili Taylor, Sam Shepard and Valerie Perrine. [#911202] $1,000
$700

1987. July 20, 1987. Ford writes, presumably to a publisher, declining to offer unspecified praise (review or book blurb) for another writer's book, despite having "some genuine admiration for it" and admitting that "he's a nice writer of sentences." At the same time, Ford gets in a pitch for Richard Bausch's book Spirits. Folded for mailing, else fine. [#912557] $150
$98

(n.p.), Twenty-Third Avenue Books/First Choice Books, 1997. A broadside excerpt from Frazier's novel, produced on the occasion of a reading by the author. Copy "A" of 26 lettered copies. 9-1/2" x 16-1/2". Signed by the author. Fine. [#912583] $500
$325

(London), Faber and Faber, (2004). A limited edition with text by Alex Garland and woodcuts by Nicholas Garland. Of a total edition of 310 copies, this is number 289 of 250 numbered copies (#s 51-300) signed by both Garlands. Folio, 17" x 12"; fine in slipcase. [#914498] $160
$104

[NY], [Harper's Magazine], 1978. One full 36 page draft, plus 30 earlier draft pages, of Gilder's 1978 article for Harper's Magazine, here provisionally titled "The Riches of Risk: An Essay on the Feasibility of Freedom." Together with a typed letter signed by Gilder to Lewis [Lapham], discussing the article and saying he will have a later draft the following week. Gilder's published article was quoted at length in Jack Kemp's book An American Renaissance: A Strategy for the 1980s, and Gilder's 1981 book, Wealth and Poverty, became a best-selling cornerstone for advocating the supply-side economics that defined the Reagan administration. Massive changes in evidence throughout: many cross-outs, deletions and emendations, some cut-and-taped. Condition: a working copy, messy by design, thus still near fine. An historic essay. [#035843] $500
$325

NY, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, (1974). His only children's book. Fine in a fine dust jacket. [#912617] $275
$179

(Toronto), HarperCollins, (1997). Second printing. Inscribed by the author to Robert Stone, "with best wishes." A bit of dampstaining to lower spine cloth; near fine in a near fine dust jacket with dampstaining on verso. [#033793] $45
$23

(NY), Ecco, (2021). The advance reading copy of this novel by the Cherokee author of Where the Dead Sit Talking, which was a finalist for the National Book Award in 2018. Very light rubbing to covers; near fine in wrappers. Uncommon in an advance issue. [#036231] $75
$38

York Harbor, (n.p.), 1919. A letter from the author, critic, and previous editor of The Atlantic Monthly to Thomas B. Wells, editor of Harper's Magazine, dated August 11, 1919. Howells expresses condolences about Alden (Henry Mills Alden, the previous editor of Harper's who had recently passed away). He offers Wells a follow-up to his "semi-autobiographical Years of My Youth" for the pages of Harper's, in advance of his intended sequel, to be titled Years of My Age. Harper's published "Eighty Years and After" in its December issue; Howells died the next May (1920), at age 83. Three paragraphs; on two sides of a 5" x 8" page. Signed "W.D. Howells". Folded in half; near fine. [#035980] $150
$98

NY, Dutton, (1978). The second issue of the uncorrected proof copy, in tall green wrappers. Erasures and label removal shadow on the front cover; small label affixed to spine; near fine. Not as scarce as the mustard-colored proof, but many times scarcer than the white advance reading copy. [#032782] $1,000
$700

Amherst, U. of Massachusetts Press, 1970. The softcover issue of this collection of poems, inscribed by the author to another poet in 1976. Fine in wrappers. [#011904] $45
$23

(Prague), Odeon, (1979). A Czech edition. A little edge-toning; near fine in a very good, rubbed dust jacket with light edge creasing. [#023513] $40
$20

Brooklyn, Mainmonides, 1971. An early report on experiments in telepathy conducted in 1971, as "suggested by Jerry Garcia," in which randomly selected images were beamed to subjects miles away, from the audiences at six Grateful Dead concerts. Co-author Stanley Krippner was one of the leading researchers into dream telepathy and telepathy ("remote viewing") in general. He and Montague Ullman, along with Alan Vaughn, published Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP in 1973. He received the American Psychological Association [APA] Award for Distinguished Lifetime Contributions to Humanistic Psychology in 2013. A variant version of this report is transcribed on Krippner's website, where he writes "The results of this study were published in a medical journal in 1973." This report is dated 1971, the year the experiments were conducted; and it appears to be the earliest formal presentation of information about this study, its circumstances, and its results. 18 pages, photocopy, with one staple, near fine. [#036218] $750
$525

NY, New American Library, (1989). The advance reading copy. Inscribed by the author (but not signed) to Robert Stone and his wife. Very good in wrappers. [#033747] $75
$38

NY, Viking, (1983). Matthiessen's controversial and suppressed book about the confrontation between American Indian activists and the FBI in the early 1970s at Pine Ridge Reservation near Wounded Knee that left two federal agents and one Indian dead, and resulted in AIM activist Leonard Peltier imprisoned for life, convicted of the agents' murder in a case that, as Matthiessen describes it, was rife with government malfeasance. This copy is inscribed by Matthiessen in the year of publication: "For Rahda & Jimmy/ with many thanks and love. Peter. In your beautiful house/ Santa Barbara/ March - 1983." Also signed in full on the front pastedown. Trace edge sunning, still a fine copy in a very good, very spine-faded dust jacket with modest edge wear. [#035589] $250
$163

(n.p.), Sports Illustrated, 1971-1973. Sports Illustrated file copies of five articles by McGuane and two Letters from the Publisher about McGuane that appeared in the magazine. The articles include "Casting on a Sea of Memories," "A Bomb in Sheep's Clothing," "Angling and Some Acts of God," "Hazardous Life in a Meat Bucket," and "Gundog Molly, Folly and Me." These, as well as the two Letters from the Publisher columns, are each stamped "Edit Ref./ [date]/ S.I." The articles are corner-stapled, with one staple failing; near fine. [#035853] $250
$163

NY, Harper & Row/Crowell, (1984). The uncorrected proof copy, which lacks the illustrations of the published version. Near fine in wrappers. [#036124] $75
$38

(Toronto), McClelland & Stewart, (1996). An advance copy, in the form of comb-bound galleys, typeset but reproducing several holograph corrections. Her third book, first novel, which was first published in Canada, and only in wrappers. Winner of the Orange Prize for Fiction, the Guardian Prize for Fiction, the Books in Canada First Novel Award and the Trillium Prize. Signed by the author. 9" x 11". Fine. [#915362] $650
$455

NY, Grove Press, (2001). The author's second collection of poems. Warmly inscribed by the author to writer Charles Newman ("her favorite dinner date") in the year of publication. Fine in wrappers. [#019701] $40
$20

Amenia, NY, 1975. Mumford declines to be a "nominator," on the grounds that he resists doing favors for anyone who might review his work, and suggests in his place Loren Eiseley or Harrison Salisbury. The letter reads as though the recipient was looking for a nomination, not for himself, but for some unnamed third party. The fascinating part is that Mumford begins the letter "I had a smothered fear, dear Van Veen," and closes it by saying "With all good wishes to you -- and Ada!" It is signed "Cordially, Lewis" (and headed with an Amenia NY address, where Mumford lived). "Van Veen" is the name of Vladimir Nabokov's protagonist in his novel Ada. Although we could find no direct connection between Mumford and Nabokov, both won the National Medal for Literature, in 1972 and 1973, respectively, and could have met at the April, 1974 ceremony where Nabokov received his. As for the nomination in question, Mumford, Eiseley, and Harrison all belonged to both the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Association. Folded in sixths; light corner creasing; near fine. [#035856] $300
$195

St. Louis, CNI/CEI, 1963-1968. 7 issues of this magazine founded by Barry Commoner, which bore three different names in its publishing history. An incomplete run: Nuclear Information, August 1963; and Scientist and Citizen for May/June 1965; April and May 1966; January 1967; January/February and December 1968. A publication of the Committee for Nuclear Information, a non-governmental organization devoted to reducing the danger of nuclear war and informing the public of the dangers of nuclear technology. The first issue here was published during the Kennedy administration, the same month that the first Nuclear Test Ban Treaty was signed between the U.S., the U.K., and the Soviet Union, an effort that had been underway for more than eight years at that point. Commoner was one of the most well-informed and highly educated of the anti-nuclear activists at that time, and as a result he retains a unique place in the history of American environmentalism: when he died in 2012, the New York Times obituary characterized him as "a founder of modern ecology and one of its most provocative thinkers and mobilizers in making environmentalism a people’s political cause." Cover stains to the earliest issue; else the lot is near fine in stapled wrappers. [#035866] $350
$228

1993. A typed letter signed by Ouellette to a friend and fellow writer, mentioning another screenplay he is working on based on an H.P. Lovecraft story -- which apparently never went into production -- and appending a printout of his four-page short story "The Fourth Witch," which appears to remain unpublished. Edge-creased, folded in thirds for mailing; near fine, with envelope included. [#031476] $175
$114

Redruth, Cornwall, U.K., Books and Things/Red Crab Design, [ca. 1972]. A broadside poem in tribute to Miriam and Kenneth Patchen. Number 5 in the Posterpoem series. Approximately 20" x 30". Unevenly folded in 16ths for mailing, and with minor edge wear; near fine. This copy is in an edgeworn envelope addressed to an employee of the St. Mary's University Library in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Uncommon: OCLC lists only one copy as being held in libraries worldwide. [#029877] $375
$244

(Sydney), Picador, (2003). Signed by the author. Slight bump to crown; else fine in self-wrappers. [#912691] $100
$65

Denver, 1967. "Washday Detergent." A postcard for a performance of Blue Cheer and Superfine Dandelion in Denver on November 3rd and 4th, 1967. 5" x 7", done by Robert Fried. Art of Rock, #FD D-10. Fine. [#008044] $125
$81

NY, Holt Rinehart Winston, (1980). Inscribed by the author to Pauline Kael "who has the dubious distinction of having first put my name and writing between hard covers. With admiration, Rich Setlowe." Setlowe was, among other things, the longtime film reviewer for Variety, and Kael quoted his review, in 1970, of Michelangelo Antonioni's film Zabriskie Point in her own New Yorker review of the same, which was later collected in Deeper Into Movies. Some dust soiling to page edges and covers; near fine in a near fine dust jacket. [#034581] $150
$98

Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 2008. A collection of poems, warmly inscribed to Peter and Maria Matthiessen. Fine in a fine dust jacket. [#032523] $100
$65

Boston, Houghton Mifflin, (1974). The uncorrected proof copy of 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. This is the second issue proof, in gold-brown wrappers with a publisher's letter to booksellers reproduced on the front cover. Signed by the author. Shallow creases to three corners; near fine in wrappers. [#912822] $500
$325

(Northampton), Tundra, 1991. A book of sketches by Totleben, one of the key artists associated with Swamp Thing and the horror anthology Taboo. Published as Number Two in the Tundra Sketchbook Series, the press that was an offshoot of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle phenomenon. Fine in wrappers. [#034609] $75
$38

NY, Knopf, 1968. The first of his novels to be both a critical and a substantial commercial success. Inscribed by the author: "For ___ ___/ with every good wish in her new environs/ John Updike." Foxing to cloth and edges of text block; mild splaying to boards; very good in a near fine dust jacket that is also foxed, mostly on verso. [#030163] $325
$211

Kittery Point, William Dean Howells Memorial Committee, 1987. One of 150 copies printed of a lecture Updike gave at Harvard as part of the 150th anniversary of Howells' birth. Published in a slightly altered form in The New Yorker, this is the first separate appearance, with an Author's Note by Updike. Approximately 40 pages of text; fine in self-wrappers with complimentary slip from the publisher laid in. Updike won the Howells Medal years later, in 1995, for Rabbit at Rest; the medal is given out for the best work of fiction in America during a five-year period. One of Updike's scarcest "A" items. [#028555] $1,000
$700

(Logan), (Perfection Form Co.), (1979). An educational pamphlet consisting of the title story of Updike's 1962 story collection, with exercises based on the story. DeBellis & Broomfield A75-a2: the cream-colored variant (no priority established between a1 and a2). Uncommon. Fine in stapled wrappers. [#031527] $100
$65

[Sacramento], (CoTangent Press), [1993]. A limited edition of a story from Thirteen Stories and Thirteen Epitaphs, preceded, in 1990 by a CoTangent edition of one handwritten folio copy, and issued here with revisions. This is Copy No. 23 of 200 copies signed by Vollmann and by the designer, Ben Pax. Illustrated by Vollmann. Fine in sewn wrappers and dust jacket. [#912137] $650
$455

NY, The New Press, (2010). A former editor of the Utne Reader explains "how to save the economy, the environment, the internet, democracy, our communities, and everything else that belongs to all of us" by way of acknowledging shared ownership and shared responsibility. Dozens of short articles written by more than two dozen authors, with illustrations and a resource guide, and featuring an introduction by Bill McKibben. Inscribed by Walljasper, with the exhortation "Viva la Commons!" Fine in wrappers. [#034650] $100
$65

Austin, Thorp Springs Press, (1982). Inscribed by the author to Robert Stone, "whose novel A Hall of Mirrors greatly influenced this one -- & for the knifing political insight you've brought to the novel in our time." Top edge foxed, otherwise near fine in a very good dust jacket with two closed, but long, edge tears. [#033790] $75
$38