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The Naked and the Dead -
Norman Mailer
1948 - Rinehart and Company, New York Toronto - First Edition
First edition of Mailer’s gritty masterpiece, penned at the age of 25 and based on his own experience of military service in the Philippines during World War Two. Scarce in such nice condition due to the notoriously delicate black dust jacket.
‘Virtually a Kinsey Report on the sexual behavior of the GI. Its style is an almost pure Army billingsgate that will offend many readers, although in no sense is it exaggerated: Mr. Mailer's soldiers are real persons, speaking the vernacular of human bitterness and agony. It gives off a skyglow that is quite faithful to the spectrum of battle, and exposes the blood, if not always the guts, of war.’ - New York Times 1948
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Price HK$ 8,500
1948 - Rinehart and Company, New York Toronto - First Edition
First edition of Mailer’s gritty masterpiece, penned at the age of 25 and based on his own experience of military service in the Philippines during World War Two. Scarce in such nice condition due to the notoriously delicate black dust jacket. ‘Virtually a Kinsey Report on the sexual behavior of the GI. Its style is an almost pure Army billingsgate that will offend many readers, although in no sense is it exaggerated: Mr. Mailer's soldiers are real persons, speaking the vernacular of human bitterness and agony. It gives off a skyglow that is quite faithful to the spectrum of battle, and exposes the blood, if not always the guts, of war.’ - New York Times 1948
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Price HK$ 8,500
The Natural -
Bernard Malamud
1952 - Harcourt, New York - First Edition
First edition of Bernard Malamud’s first novel, widely considered as one of the greatest baseball narratives of all time, the basis for the acclaimed 1984 film of the same name directed by Barry Levinson, and starring Robert Redford, Glenn Close, Robert Duvall and Kim Basinger.
‘This book established that we could have a serious adult baseball novel by playing with the parallels between mythical elements in the game and mythical elements in literature’. – Chicago Tribune.
‘A brilliant and unusually fine novel.’ – The New York Times.
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Price HK$ 16,000
1952 - Harcourt, New York - First Edition
First edition of Bernard Malamud’s first novel, widely considered as one of the greatest baseball narratives of all time, the basis for the acclaimed 1984 film of the same name directed by Barry Levinson, and starring Robert Redford, Glenn Close, Robert Duvall and Kim Basinger.‘This book established that we could have a serious adult baseball novel by playing with the parallels between mythical elements in the game and mythical elements in literature’. – Chicago Tribune.
‘A brilliant and unusually fine novel.’ – The New York Times.
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Price HK$ 16,000
Every Day is Mother's Day -
Hilary Mantel
1985 - Chatto &, London - First Edition
A fine first edition of Hilary Mantel’s first novel, in the dust jacket without any of the usual fading to the spine lettering and scarce as such. Described by the New York Times as ‘a giddy cocktail of horror and gleeful anticipation’.
‘Set in 1970s England, Hilary Mantel’s first novel is a wild amalgam of social satire and gothic motifs, and also a powerful characterization of the lingering effects of abuse.’ – Narrative.
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Price HK$ 8,000
1985 - Chatto &, London - First Edition
A fine first edition of Hilary Mantel’s first novel, in the dust jacket without any of the usual fading to the spine lettering and scarce as such. Described by the New York Times as ‘a giddy cocktail of horror and gleeful anticipation’.‘Set in 1970s England, Hilary Mantel’s first novel is a wild amalgam of social satire and gothic motifs, and also a powerful characterization of the lingering effects of abuse.’ – Narrative.
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Price HK$ 8,000
Suttree -
Cormac McCarthy
1979 - Random House, New York - First Edition
Fine, thus scarce first edition of what many feel to be McCarthy’s finest work.
‘But there are no absolutes in human misery and things can always get worse’
‘The book comes at us like a horrifying flood. The language licks, batters, wounds—a poetic, troubled rush of debris. It is personal and tough, without that boring neatness and desire for resolution that you can get in any well-made novel. Cormac McCarthy has little mercy to spare, for his characters or himself. His text is broken, beautiful and ugly in spots. Mr. McCarthy won’t soothe us with a quiet song. Suttree is like a good, long scream in the ear.’ – Jerome Charyn, The New York Times, February 18,1979.
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Price HK$ 32,000
1979 - Random House, New York - First Edition
Fine, thus scarce first edition of what many feel to be McCarthy’s finest work.‘But there are no absolutes in human misery and things can always get worse’
‘The book comes at us like a horrifying flood. The language licks, batters, wounds—a poetic, troubled rush of debris. It is personal and tough, without that boring neatness and desire for resolution that you can get in any well-made novel. Cormac McCarthy has little mercy to spare, for his characters or himself. His text is broken, beautiful and ugly in spots. Mr. McCarthy won’t soothe us with a quiet song. Suttree is like a good, long scream in the ear.’ – Jerome Charyn, The New York Times, February 18,1979.
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Price HK$ 32,000
The Border Trilogy - All The Pretty Horses, The Crossing, Cities of the Plain -
Cormac McCarthy
1992 - Alfred A. Knopf, New York - First Editions
McCarthy’s brilliant Border Trilogy in first edition.
The young men in these novels come of age on south-western ranches in the 1930s, while across the border Mexico beckons them with its desolate beauty and the cruel promise of a place where dreams are paid for in blood.
‘An American classic to stand with the finest literary achievements of the century.’ - San Francisco Chronicle
In All the Pretty Horses, young John Grady Cole, dispossessed by the sale of his family's Texas ranch, heads across the border in search of the cowboy life, finding a job breaking horses and a dangerously ill-fated romance. In The Crossing, 16-year-old Billy Parham captures a she-wolf that has been marauding his family's ranch and instead of killing it decides to take it on a perilous journey home to the mountains of Mexico. These drifters come together years later in Cities of the Plain, a magnificent tale of friendship and passion. McCarthy's haunting evocation of two young men poised on the edge of a world about to change forever serves as a darkly beautiful elegy for the American frontier. [Picador]
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Price HK$ 8,000
1992 - Alfred A. Knopf, New York - First Editions
McCarthy’s brilliant Border Trilogy in first edition.The young men in these novels come of age on south-western ranches in the 1930s, while across the border Mexico beckons them with its desolate beauty and the cruel promise of a place where dreams are paid for in blood.
‘An American classic to stand with the finest literary achievements of the century.’ - San Francisco Chronicle
In All the Pretty Horses, young John Grady Cole, dispossessed by the sale of his family's Texas ranch, heads across the border in search of the cowboy life, finding a job breaking horses and a dangerously ill-fated romance. In The Crossing, 16-year-old Billy Parham captures a she-wolf that has been marauding his family's ranch and instead of killing it decides to take it on a perilous journey home to the mountains of Mexico. These drifters come together years later in Cities of the Plain, a magnificent tale of friendship and passion. McCarthy's haunting evocation of two young men poised on the edge of a world about to change forever serves as a darkly beautiful elegy for the American frontier. [Picador]
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Price HK$ 8,000
The Sand Pebbles -
Richard McKenna
1963 - Victor Gollancz, London - First English Edition
Fine copy in nice bright unclipped and scarce dust jacket. The story of a US naval river boat based on the Yangtze river in 1925, the author served for ten years in the US Navy in the Far East, two of them on a Yangtze River gunboat.
The basis for the film starring Steve McQueen, Richard Attenborough, Richard Crenna and Candice Bergen. Later republished by the U. S. Naval Institute as part of their ‘Classics of Naval Literature’ series.
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Price HK$ 2,500
1963 - Victor Gollancz, London - First English Edition
Fine copy in nice bright unclipped and scarce dust jacket. The story of a US naval river boat based on the Yangtze river in 1925, the author served for ten years in the US Navy in the Far East, two of them on a Yangtze River gunboat.The basis for the film starring Steve McQueen, Richard Attenborough, Richard Crenna and Candice Bergen. Later republished by the U. S. Naval Institute as part of their ‘Classics of Naval Literature’ series.
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Price HK$ 2,500
Tropic of Cancer - with - Tropic of Capricorn -
Henry Miller, Ana
1945 - The Obelisk Press, Paris - Second Edition, Fourth Impression
Two early printings of Miller’s classics, controversial at the time. In the wonderful paper wrappers as published in Paris by the risk taking Obelisk Press of Jack Kahane. Consisting of the sixth Obelisk printing of Tropic of Cancer with a preface by Anaïs Nin and the second Obelisk printing of Tropic of Capricorn. Both printed in August of 1945 after the Obelisk Press reopened for business, to take advantage of the huge numbers of Allied Forces present in Paris immediately after the war.
Rare to find such a brace in their delicate paper wrappers in such wonderful condition, especially considering their likely arduous journey from a war torn Paris of 1945 to the United States.
Henry Miller's collaboration with the French Obelisk Press in the 1930s produced three phenomenal works, all promptly banned in America and Great Britain. The groundbreaking Tropic of Cancer published by Jack Kahane in 1934 after Anais Nin helped cover costs, its followup Tropic of Capricorn, finally printed in 1939, and Black Spring, a collection of vignettes and tales from 1936.
Now hailed as an American classic, Tropic of Cancer was banned in the U.S.A. as obscene for 27 years after its first publication in Paris by Jack Kahane of Obelisk Press in 1934. Only a historic court ruling that changed American censorship standards – and the tireless efforts of Grove Press publisher Barney Rosset – permitted the U.S.A. publication in 1961 of this famed mixture of memoir and fiction, which chronicles with unapologetic gusto the bawdy adventures of a young expatriate writer, his friends, and the characters they meet in Paris in the 1930s.
Tropic of Capricorn, the companion volume to Tropic of Cancer, chronicles Miller’s life in 1920s New York City. Famous for its frank portrayal of life in Brooklyn’s ethnic neighborhoods and Miller’s outrageous sexual exploits.
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Price HK$ 5,500
1945 - The Obelisk Press, Paris - Second Edition, Fourth Impression
Two early printings of Miller’s classics, controversial at the time. In the wonderful paper wrappers as published in Paris by the risk taking Obelisk Press of Jack Kahane. Consisting of the sixth Obelisk printing of Tropic of Cancer with a preface by Anaïs Nin and the second Obelisk printing of Tropic of Capricorn. Both printed in August of 1945 after the Obelisk Press reopened for business, to take advantage of the huge numbers of Allied Forces present in Paris immediately after the war.Rare to find such a brace in their delicate paper wrappers in such wonderful condition, especially considering their likely arduous journey from a war torn Paris of 1945 to the United States.
Henry Miller's collaboration with the French Obelisk Press in the 1930s produced three phenomenal works, all promptly banned in America and Great Britain. The groundbreaking Tropic of Cancer published by Jack Kahane in 1934 after Anais Nin helped cover costs, its followup Tropic of Capricorn, finally printed in 1939, and Black Spring, a collection of vignettes and tales from 1936.
Now hailed as an American classic, Tropic of Cancer was banned in the U.S.A. as obscene for 27 years after its first publication in Paris by Jack Kahane of Obelisk Press in 1934. Only a historic court ruling that changed American censorship standards – and the tireless efforts of Grove Press publisher Barney Rosset – permitted the U.S.A. publication in 1961 of this famed mixture of memoir and fiction, which chronicles with unapologetic gusto the bawdy adventures of a young expatriate writer, his friends, and the characters they meet in Paris in the 1930s.
Tropic of Capricorn, the companion volume to Tropic of Cancer, chronicles Miller’s life in 1920s New York City. Famous for its frank portrayal of life in Brooklyn’s ethnic neighborhoods and Miller’s outrageous sexual exploits.
More details
Price HK$ 5,500
Portrait of Jennie -
Robert Nathan
1940 - Alfred A. Knopf, New York - First Edition
The basis for the 1948 William Dieterle film starring Joseph Cotten and Jennifer Jones, which won academy award for special effects, and was nominated for Best Cinematography.
The supernatural love story of a depression era artist in New York and a young girl slipping through time’, a modern Dorian Gray...
‘So brilliant is Nathan's execution that one is entirely lost in the tender love story of two immortally designed for each other, one a spirit out of the past seeking to catch up with the present, the other a man rooted in the present and caught in an urgency to accept the gift of the past . . . Portrait of Jennie will perhaps most vividly recall Balderston's Berkeley Square, for, like that, it is a love story that transcends the boundaries of time. It is told with tenderness and with beauty. Its mood lingers in the heart, and its planes challenge the mind.’ – New York Times.
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Price HK$ 3,000
1940 - Alfred A. Knopf, New York - First Edition
The basis for the 1948 William Dieterle film starring Joseph Cotten and Jennifer Jones, which won academy award for special effects, and was nominated for Best Cinematography.The supernatural love story of a depression era artist in New York and a young girl slipping through time’, a modern Dorian Gray...
‘So brilliant is Nathan's execution that one is entirely lost in the tender love story of two immortally designed for each other, one a spirit out of the past seeking to catch up with the present, the other a man rooted in the present and caught in an urgency to accept the gift of the past . . . Portrait of Jennie will perhaps most vividly recall Balderston's Berkeley Square, for, like that, it is a love story that transcends the boundaries of time. It is told with tenderness and with beauty. Its mood lingers in the heart, and its planes challenge the mind.’ – New York Times.
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Price HK$ 3,000