Richard Wright – Native Son – First Edition 1940
£2,750.00
A first edition, first printing of ‘Native Son’ published by Gollancz in 1940. A very good book with wear to the edges and spine tips and corners. Small name (Charles Mills) to the front endpaper. In a very good dust wrapper (browned to the spine – pin hole therein as well as a little light chipping to the spine tips and corners – a classic Gollancz war-time dust wrapper, with reviews from the American press as well as from Victor Gollancz himself. A notable milestone in publishing history.
Published in 1940 by Harper & Brothers, ‘Native Son’ was an immediate success, selling hundreds of thousands of copies and becoming a Book-of-the-Month Club selection—the first by an African American author. The novel brought Wright international recognition. In the UK, it was issued by Victor Gollancz Ltd, whose distinctive yellow dust jackets made it visually striking in British bookshops. Some editions faced censorship for sexual content. The novel’s rapid sales, stage adaptation, and overseas publication cemented its status as a landmark of twentieth-century American literature.
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- Description
Description
A first edition, first printing of ‘Native Son’ published by Gollancz in 1940. A very good book with wear to the edges and spine tips and corners. Small name (Charles Mills) to the front endpaper. In a very good dust wrapper (browned to the spine – pin hole therein as well as a little light chipping to the spine tips and corners – a classic Gollancz war-time dust wrapper, with reviews from the American press as well as from Victor Gollancz himself. A notable milestone in publishing history.
Published in 1940 by Harper & Brothers, ‘Native Son’ was an immediate success, selling hundreds of thousands of copies and becoming a Book-of-the-Month Club selection—the first by an African American author. The novel brought Wright international recognition. In the UK, it was issued by Victor Gollancz Ltd, whose distinctive yellow dust jackets made it visually striking in British bookshops. Some editions faced censorship for sexual content. The novel’s rapid sales, stage adaptation, and overseas publication cemented its status as a landmark of twentieth-century American literature.
