“AN’ YOU GET TO TEND THE RABBITS”: SCARCE FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE, OF STEINBECK’S CLASSIC OF MICE AND MEN
STEINBECK, John. Of Mice and Men. New York: Covici Friede, (1937). Small octavo, original beige cloth, original dust jacket. Housed in a custom cloth slipcase.
First edition, first issue, of Steinbeck’s “beautifully written [and] marvelous picture of the tragedy of loneliness” (Eleanor Roosevelt), in scarce original dust jacket.
"As a young man, Steinbeck worked on ranches in the small towns around Salinas, absorbing local color later applied to the Soledad, California setting of this novel, originally entitled Something That Happened" (Salinas Public Library, 24). The author began Of Mice and Men as a children's story. "Although the finished novelette does not seem appropriate for children—that intention was obviously abandoned—the simplicity of its style and the clarity and precision of its imagery may well have been prompted by this original purpose… " (Benson, 326). The result is "a sophisticated and artful rendering of the basic conflict between two worlds: between an idealized landscape and the real world with its pain and anguish" (Literary History of the American West, 433). First issue, with the words "and only moved because the heavy hands were pendula" printed as lines 20 and 21 on page 9, and bullet between the eights on page 88. Goldstone & Payne A7a. Bruccoli & Clark I:354.
Book with interior quite nice and only slightest soiling to cloth, dust jacket with only light rubbing and toning to extremities. A lovely near-fine copy.