Lot 206
  • 206

Crane, Stephen

Estimate
10,000 - 15,000 USD
bidding is closed

Description

  • Crane, Stephen
  • The Red Badge of Courage: An Episode of the American Civil War. New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1896.
  • paper, ink
8vo (7 3/16 x 4 7/8 in.; 183 x 123 mm). Newspaper clipping taped to endpaper, few margins chipped or roughly opened, lower corners of pages 101-137 chipped away but not affecting text. Publisher's oatmeal buckram, lettered and ornamented in red, black, and gold; fraying to spine ends, spine darkened.

presentation copy of the greatest civil war novel, "To F H King With good fellowship and esteem From Stephen Crane New York Oct 28."



Artist F H King was a close friend of Crane's and shot one of the best known formal photographic  portraits of him at the time Red Badge was receiving its first laudatory reviews.



Presentation copies of this cornerstone of American literature are rare; only two  have sold at auction in 40 years. The most recent, the Neville copy, was also a later printing, as was the signed copy offered by bookseller Glenn Horowitz in 2001.