American Buffalo

New York: Grove Press, 1976

FIRST EDITION, hardcover issue, SIGNED BY MAMET on dedication page.

Winner of the 1976 Obie Award and the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best American Play of 1977; made into a 1996 film starring Dustin Hoffman.

Octavo, original yellow cloth, original dust jacket; custom half-morocco box. A FINE COPY.

$1,400

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The Bluest Eye

FIRST EDITION, SIGNED AND INSCRIBED on front free endpaper: "To John / Love, gratitude - all of that. / Toni / 11.5.70". Inscribed to and from the library of John A. Williams, with his signed card laid-in. The recipient, John Alfred Williams, is a noted African-American writer and academic. Octavo, original half-cloth over boards, original dust jacket.; custom half-morocco box. Book fine, some toning to edges and spine of dust jacket. An outstanding inscribed association copy of the rare first edition.

$7,200

Hudibras. The First and Second Parts

FIRST COMBINED EDITION. "Its distinctive octosyllabic couplets and MOCK-HEROIC style gave rise to the term 'Hudibrastics'. It was immensely popular in its time for its satire (partly inspired by Cervantes and Rabelais) against Puratinism and the tyranny of the Commonwealth." – The Cambridge Guide to Literature in EnglishOctavo. Perfunctory calf binding, title remargined at inner hinge, cropped somewhat close at top of text block, scattered early and elegant marginal annotations in ink. A sound copy.

$250

I, Claudius

FIRST EDITION of Graves' remarkable work of historical fiction. "In the present work, I swear by the Gods, I am my own mere secretary, and my own official annalist: I am writing with my own hand, and what favour can I hope to win from myself by flattery?" –I, ClaudiusOctavo, original cloth, original dust jacket.

$450

Der Tod in Venedig [Death in Venice]

FIRST TRADE EDITION, one of only 2000 copies.In 1912, Mann "returned to the tragic dilemma of the artist with Death in Venice, a sombre masterpiece. In this story, the main character, a distinguished writer whose nervous and 'decadent' sensibility is controlled by the discipline of style and composition, seeks relaxation from overstrain in Venice, where, as disease creeps over the city, he succumbs to an infatuation and the wish for death. Symbols of eros and death weave a subtle pattern in the sensuous opulence of this tale, which closes an epoch in Mann’s work" (Roy Pascal, Britannica).Preceded by the extremely rare deluxe limited edition of 100 copies from 1912.Octavo, publisher's half-vellum binding with blue paper spine label lettered in gilt; marbled paper-covered boards, top edge gilt. Toning and soiling to spine; small stain to outer edge of text block.

$3,200

The Bikeriders

First edition (cloth issue) SIGNED by Lyon. Book fine (without remainder mark), dust jacket with small tear at heel of spine, small closed tear to top of front panel, faint crease to front flap.

$3,500

Julia's Kitchen Wisdom

FIRST EDITION, SIGNED AND INSCRIBED BY JULIA CHILD. Octavo, original cloth, original jacket. An exceptional copy. Rare signed.

$175

The Deep Range

"Hope faded as his radius of vision grew and the screen remained empty. Again and again he called into the lonely silence, while grief and helplessness strove for the mastery of his soul."FIRST EDITION, review copy. In a departure from Arthur C. Clarke's usual medium of outer space, The Deep Range is a novel of the sea, and shows off Clarke's "impressive talents as astronomer, deep-sea naturalist, and novelist" (from the dust jacket). Octavo, original green boards, original dust jacket. With review slip tabbed in. Book fine, light edgewear to dust jacket.

$300

The Twenty-Seventh City

FIRST EDITION, SIGNED BY FRANZEN on front free endpaper. Jonathan Franzen’s first novel has been compared to Richard Powers, David Foster Wallace, and Don DeLillo “for its labyrinthine plot, its manipulation of multiple viewpoints, and its use of systems theory” (ibid.). Octavo, original half-cloth over boards. original dust jacket. Book near-fine with slight lean, dust jacket fine.

$250

Blood for a Stranger

FIRST EDITION of Jarrell's first book, SIGNED and INSCRIBED BY JARRELL.Octavo. Original red cloth, original dust jacket. Cloth clean, dust jacket very good with minor wear at spine heel and slight toning at spine. Signed and inscribed by Jarrell on the front free endpaper. Custom cloth clamshell box.

$1,200

The Fifth Column and The First Forty-Nine Stories

FIRST EDITION of Hemingway's most comprehesive collection of short stories, published with The Fifth Column, Hemingway's only full-length play."Five years after publishing Winner Take Nothing (1933), he collected the three separate volumes of stories and added to them a handful of other pieces-- four stories written after 1933: "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" (1936), "The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber (1936), "The Capital of the World" (1936), and "Old Man at the Bridge" (1937); one early story previously bypassed for commercial publication, "Up in Michigan" (1923, Three Stories and Ten Poems); and The Fifth Column, a play set in Civil-War Spain- to make up The Fifth Column and The First Forty-Nine Stories (1938), the only collective gathering of his stories to appear during his lifetime" (Bendixen, A Companion to the American Short Story).Octavo, original cloth, original dust jacket; custom box. Book near fine, dust jacket bright and clean with only trivial wear. An excellent copy.

$4,600

The White Goddess

FIRST EDITION. "It is ... arguable that [The White Goddess] marked the end of Modernism as the dominant mode in British and Irish poetry. Those stirred by its enchantments, from Hughes and Heaney to Simon Armitage, as well as those who turned away in distaste (Philip Larkin among them), have learned from Modernism but have no longer cared for its formal and emotional stringencies... The White Goddess has remained in tune with the times, reprinted time after time and quietly gathering new readers and enthusiasts iwth every generation." –Ian Firla and Grevel Lindop, Graves and the Goddess: Essays on Robert Graves's The White GoddessOctavo. Original cloth, original dust jacket.

$550

Les Chiens ont Soif

LIMITED EDITION, WITH TWO SIGNED COLOR ETCHINGS BY MAX ERNST, and 25 additional color lithographs; one of only 250 copies (out of a total edition of 320). An evocative collaboration between the surrealist poet Prevert and the surrealist artist Ernst. The Livre d'Artiste in the Twentieth Century 46. Large folio, loose as issued in original lithographed paper wrappers; original buckram clamshell box. Fraying to box edges, some foxing to wrappers; interior and plates fine.

$2,500

Mamet, David