January 2024: Epistolary Novels and Letters

Epistolary Novels and Letters composed the theme for the January 2024 meeting.  Modern novels were featured for the epistolary fiction—not by design but simply by what the collectors chose to present—while the published collections of nonfiction letters ranged more broadly from the early 1800s to the present.  Several unpublished letters held in private collections were also shown.

Epistolary Novels

The Screwtape Letters

Lewis, C. S.  The Screwtape Letters.  New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1943.  First American edition.  Screwtape is a senior demon living in Hell who holds a bureaucratic post in the "lowerarchy" of demons.  He is tasked with mentoring his nephew Wormwood, an inexperienced and incompetent tempter living among humans.  Wormwood must secure a man's damnation, and Screwtape writes a series of letters offering advice for tempting the man, known only as "the Patient," away from God.  Lewis's satirical, fictional story is a Christian apologetic for resisting evil.  The Screwtape Letters was originally published in England in 1942; the first American edition was released a full year later.

The Screwtape Letters, Rev. Ed.

Lewis, C. S.  The Screwtape Letters.  New York: Collier Books / Macmillan Publishing Company, 1982.  Revised edition.  This revised edition includes The Screwtape Letters (1942), the coda "Screwtape Proposes a Toast" (1959), Lewis's Preface to The Screwtape Letters (1960), and a previously unpublished Preface to "Screwtape Proposes a Toast."  This omnibus was first published together in 1960.

 

The Father Christmas Letters

Tolkien, J. R. R.  The Father Christmas Letters.  Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1979.  Tolkien began writing Christmas letters to his children when his oldest son was three, in 1920.  The letters, stories from Father Christmas to the Tolkien children, continued annually for the next 20 years.  Tolkien also illustrated each letter and delivered it each Christmas in an envelope bearing North Pole stamps and postmarks.  Tolkien's letters from Father Christmas were gathered and edited for publication by Baillie Tolkien, his daughter-in-law, and posthumously published in 1976.  Some letters and drawings were absent from the 1976 book.  The book was republished in 1999 to include the omitted material and retitled Letters from Father Christmas.

 

Last Days of Summer and Almost Like Being in Love

Kluger, Steve.  Last Days of Summer.  New York: Harper Perennial, 2002.  First published in 1998.  The story follows Joey, a twelve-year-old Jewish boy growing up in an Italian Brooklyn neighborhood in the 1940s, and the pen-pal friendship he develops with Charlie, the third baseman for the New York Giants.  As their letter-writing friendship develops, Charlie becomes a surrogate father figure for Joey and the relationship changes both of their lives.  The story is told primarily through their correspondence but also includes, postcards, newspaper headlines and clippings, a psychiatrist's session transcripts, and other letters and documents.  Last Days of Summer received a 1999 Alex Award from the American Library Association, recognizing "books written for adults that have special appeal to young adults ages 12 through 18."

Kluger, Steve.  Almost Like Being in Love.  New York: Harper Perennial, 2004.  First edition.  The story begins with high school seniors Travis and Craig meeting on the set of the school's production of Brigadoon.  They begin a whirlwind romance that continues throughout the summer after they graduate.  They fall out of touch, however, as they depart for separate colleges, but twenty years later Travis realizes he still loves Craig and sets off on a cross-country journey to rekindle his relationship with his one true love.  The story is told through diary entries, letters and emails, inner-office memos, and post-it notes.  Almost Like Being in Love won the 2005 Lambda Literary Award for Romance.

 

World War Z

Brooks, Max.  World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War.  New York: Crown Publishers, 2006.  First edition.  World War Z is a sequel (or prequel?) to Brooks's The Zombie Survival Guide (2003).  It details a global apocalyptic zombie plague and the resultant political, economic, social, religious, and environmental impacts on the planet.  The story is told through interview transcripts from a series of personal accounts from individuals all over the world who experienced and survived the zombie plague, as told to an agent of the United Nations Postwar Commission.  The agent is a fictionalized Max Brooks, who authored (authors?) The Zombie Survival Guide.

 

The Martian

Weir, Andy.  The Martian.  New York: Crown Publishers, 2014.  First edition.  Weir's science fiction story was originally self-published as a serialized blog in 2011.  In 2014, it was published in book format with significant textual changes.  In the year 2035, NASA astronaut Mark Watney is presumed dead as the rest of his team flees a dust storm on Mars.  Watney survives and, alone on the hostile planet, must improvise and rely on his own resourcefulness to survive until, if at all, NASA can rescue him.  The story is told through the logs Watney records to document and preserve his experiences.  The Martian earned the 2016 Hugo Award's John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer for Weir, and the Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form, Award for the adapted screenplay.

 

The Themis Files
Sleeping Giants, Waking Gods, and Only Human

Neuvel, Sylvain.  Sleeping Giants.  Burton, MI: Subterranean Press, 2019.  Book One of The Themis Files trilogy, first published in 2016.  This edition is illustrated by Pascal Blanche and signed by the author.

Neuvel, Sylvain.  Waking Gods.  Burton, MI: Subterranean Press, 2019.  Book Two of The Themis Files trilogy, first published in 2017.  This edition is illustrated by Pascal Blanche and signed by the author.

Neuvel, Sylvain.  Only Human.  Burton, MI: Subterranean Press, 2019.  Book Three of The Themis Files trilogy, first published in 2018.  This edition is illustrated by Pascal Blanche and signed by the author.

The Themis Files trilogy came about after the author's son asked him not only to build a toy robot but also to provide a full backstory for the robot.  The son wanted to know where the robot came from and what it did.  This request inspired the first book, Sleeping Giants, and ultimately the trilogy.  The Themis Files follows a team of scientists formed to track down and reassemble a giant robot of mysterious origins whose parts are scattered across the globe.  The team is led by physicist Rose Franklin, who as a child first discovered and unearthed a giant metallic hand and now as an adult has devoted her career to solving the mystery of the colossal robot.  The story is told through a series of journal entries, transcribed dialogues, and other forms of documentation. 

 

Letters

Ray Bradbury letter

Bradbury, Ray, Hollywood, California, to Dan Miller, Saint Paul, Minnesota, 11 July 1965.  Private collection, Atlanta, Georgia.  When a 20-year-old college sophomore who wants to become a writer sends a fan letter to his favorite author in 1965, Ray Bradbury writes back.  In his reply, Bradbury compares the fan's connection to his work to his own regard for one of his writing influences:

The feeling you describe about your relationship to my work is similar to one I had years ago in reading Graham Greene.  He was my special shocker-dynamo-revver-upper.  One page of him and I was off and flying.

This letter echoes a sentiment Bradbury expressed directly to Graham Greene in a letter dated April 18, 1979, selected in Jonathan Eller's Remembrance (below):

Also, on many days of my life in the past 30 years, when I have had a touch of dry spell, I get out the short stories of Graham Greene and re-read them and prime the pump and go back to my work with love and energy.

 

Neil Armstrong letter

Pearson, Mark, Sun City, Arizona, to Neil A. Armstrong, Houston, Texas, 15 June 1969.  Private collection, Atlanta, Georgia.  Mimeographed copy of a handwritten letter to Apollo XI Commander Neil Armstrong.  Pearson became aware of an invitation for suggestions naming the Apollo XI lunar landing site.  In his letter to Commander Armstrong, he suggests the name Eldorado from a poem by Edgar Allan Poe which he quotes, "Over the Mountains of the Moon, Down the Valley of the Shadow, Ride boldly ride," the shade replied, "If you seek for Eldorado!" 

Armstrong, Neil A., Houston, Texas, to Mark Pearson, Sun City, Arizona, 30 June 1969.  Private collection, Atlanta, Georgia.  One-page typed letter from Neil Armstrong (1930 – 2012) on National Aeronautics and Space Administration letterhead to Mark Pearson, an engineer in General Electric’s Missile and Space Division.  Armstrong replied in his letter thanking him and boldly signed his name.  This letter is dated just weeks before the launch that would take the crew to the moon and Neil Armstrong would become the first man to walk on the moon.  The letter and signature have been authenticated by Zarelli Space Authentication.  Additional material was included when this collector received the letter providing provenance.

Nota bene: This letter from the first man to walk on the moon is highly desirable especially for a collector of astronaut signatures and even more so since this collector has a major collection of astronaut-signed books and a major collection of books by and about Edgar Allan Poe.  Armstrong's letter is an important bridge between the collector's two collections and a truly amazing addition and, as the collector says, "like a dream come true."

 

Michael Collins letter

Collins, Michael, Washington, D.C., to Lee D. Saegesser, Washington, D.C., 17 March 1977.  Private collection, Atlanta, Georgia.  One-page typed letter from Michael Collins (1930 – 2021) on National Air and Space Museum letterhead to Lee D. Saegesser, Chief Archivist at the D.C. NASA Headquarters History Office at that time.  Collins thanks him for a very useful volume, Origins of NASA Names.  Michael Collins joined Neil Armstrong on the Apollo XI flight to the moon and waited in moon orbit as Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon.

 

Collections of Letters

The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution

Sparks, Jared, ed.  The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution; Being the Letters of Benjamin Franklin, Silas Deane, John Adams, John Jay, Arthur Lee, William Lee, Ralph Izard, Francis Dana, William Carmichael, Henry Laurens, John Laurens, M. De Lafayette, M. Dumas and Others, Concerning the Foreign Relations of the United States During the Whole Revolution; Together with the Letters in Reply from the Secret Committee of Congress, and the Secretary of Foreign Affairs. Also, The Entire Correspondence of the French Ministers, Gerard and Luzerne, with Congress. Published Under the Direction of the President of the United States, from the Original Manuscripts in the Department of State, Conformably to a Resolution of Congress, of March 27th, 1818.  Boston: Nathan Hale and Gray & Bowen, 1829-1830.  In 12 volumes.  Volumes 1-5 are dated 1829; volumes 6-12 are dated 1830.  Jared Sparks (1789 – 1866) was Unitarian minister, historian, and educator.  He pastored the First Independent Church of Baltimore until 1823, when he stepped down for health reasons.  He moved to Boston and turned his attention to history, becoming the editor of, and contributor to, the North American Review as well as becoming a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Antiquarian Society.  During this time, he compiled and published The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution.  Following this massive undertaking, he turned his attention to another one, publishing The Writings of George Washington in 12 volumes (1834 – 1837), considered his most important work.  In 1849, he became president of Harvard College.  The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Volume 7 (shown), contains the correspondence of John Adams with such figures as John Jay, Robert R. Livingston, and Charles W. F. Dumas.

 

Letters to John Glenn

Glenn, John.  Letters to John Glenn: P.S. I Listened to Your Heart Beat.  Houston, TX: World Book Encyclopedia, 1964.  John Glenn (1921 – 2016) was the first American to orbit the Earth, circling it three times on February 20, 1962, aboard the Friendship 7 flight.  After that historic flight, Glenn began receiving letters from people of all ages and from all walks of life, and from all over the world.  The letters poured in for several years, and in 1964 World Book Encyclopedia published a selection of the favorite and best letters Glenn received.  This copy is inscribed by John Glenn to the collector.

 

84, Charing Cross Road

Hanff, Helene.  84, Charing Cross Road.  New York: Grossman Publishers, 1970.  Helene Hanff (1916 – 1997), an American writer living in New York City, had difficulty locating some obscure British books she wanted to read.  When she saw an advertisement in the Saturday Review of Literature for Marks & Co antiquarian booksellers in London, she wrote to them in 1949 for assistance; Frank Doel, the chief buyer for the bookshop, replied. Beyond the book searches and purchases, Hanff and Doel exchanged letters regularly for almost 20 years.  A long-distance friendship developed between the two, and Hanff became invested in the lives of the other employees at 84 Charing Cross Road, the location of Marks & Co.  She wrote about her life in Manhattan and even exchanged Christmas and birthday gifts with the friends in London she never had a chance to meet.  Shortly after Doel's death in 1968, the store closed.  Upon learning this, Hanff selected and arranged her collection of letters for publication.

 

Dear David, Dear Graham

Greene, Graham and David Low.  Dear David, Dear Graham: A Bibliographic Correspondence.  Oxford: The Alembic Press, 1989.  Novelist Graham Greene said on several occasions that had he not been a writer he would have liked to be a secondhand bookseller.  Renowned Cecil Court bookseller David Low found joy in locating the books his customers sought and suggesting books he thought they might want.  The two men first met in the 1930s but formed a strong friendship during World War II as they both served as Air-raid wardens for the same post.  Collected here are the letters they exchanged from 1971 through 1984, mostly reminiscences between two friends of their mutual love for old books, the old booksellers of Charing Cross and Cecil Court, and news of the book trade.  The collection also includes behind-the-scenes work on books published by the Amate Press, including introductions written by Greene for Low's With All Faults (1973) and J. R. Fox's Bridging the Gulf (1983).  This copy is number 17 of 50 quarter leather bound copies out of the larger limited edition of 250 copies.  The specially bound copies include tipped in photos of Low and Greene not included in the cloth-bound copies.

 

Yours, etc.

Greene, Graham.  Yours etc.: Letters to the Press 1945-89.  London: Reinhardt Books, 1989.  Selected and introduced by Christopher Hawtree.  After college and before establishing himself as a novelist, Greene worked as a sub-editor for The Times and occasionally filled in for the correspondence editor, where he learned the value and role of writing letters to the press.  While Greene diligently wrote letters to correct erroneous reports or reviews of himself or his works, he more often wrote about current events, global politics, and social injustices far removed from the literary scene.  He used his fame and the power of the press to deliver concise, often biting, criticisms of persons and institutions he felt were in the wrong.  He penned letters to the press to make his stances known and a matter of public record.

 

Dear Juliette

Sherman, Susan, ed.  Dear Juliette: Letters of May Sarton to Juliette Huxley.  New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1999.  First edition.  Selected, edited, and introduced by Susan Sherman.  Foreword by Francis Huxley.  May Sarton had a secret affair with Juliette Huxley after ending an open affair with her husband, Julian Huxley (brother of Aldus Huxley), which began in 1936.  Juliette ended the physical relationship after Julian learned of it, but she and May maintained a close relationship throughout the rest of their lives.  After the brief physical relationship, May and Juliette continued an emotional romance, mostly through letters, which Juliette ended in 1948 when May threatened to tell Julian.  After Julian's death in 1975, the women resumed their soulmate correspondence.  Susan Sherman, a close friend of Sarton, collected the private correspondence between the two women beginning in 1936 and continuing to Juliette's death in 1994.

 

Graham Greene: A Life in Letters

Greene, Richard, ed.  Graham Greene: A Life in Letters.  New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2008.  First American edition.  Graham Greene was a consummate, life-long letter writer.  This collection focuses on his personal correspondence with family, friends, colleagues, and contemporaries; a few important professional letters are also included.  Richard Greene (no relation) selects and arranges these letters in chronological order from a 16-year-old writing to his mother while traveling abroad in 1921 to a final letter to his biographer a month before his death in 1991.  This volume includes only the letters written by Graham and does not include letters to him; Richard Greene provides a brief context to some of the letters.  This copy is signed by Richard Greene on the title page.

 

Remembrance

Eller, Jonathan R., ed.  Remembrance: Selected Correspondence of Ray Bradbury.  New York: Simon & Schuster, 2023.  Bradbury scholar and biographer Jonathan Eller selects and categorizes 70 years of correspondence to and from Bradbury, from a 17-year-old Bradbury inviting Edgar Rice Burroughs to come speak to his branch of the Science Fiction Leage of America in 1937 to a 2007 letter from the Ambassador of France to the United States congratulating Bradbury on his meritorious decoration as Commandeur in the Order of Arts and Letters.  Eller groups the correspondence with mentors and influencers; emerging writers and literary contemporaries; screenwriters, directors, and other filmmakers; agents, editors, and publishers; and friends and family.  Another category concerns letters about war and intolerance, two themes which inspired some of Bradbury's best writing.

 

December 2023: Georgia Authors (who are not Margaret Mitchell)

The December 2023 meeting surveyed Georgia Authors.  To avoid seeing multiple copies of Gone With the Wind—and, more importantly, to spotlight other Georgia writers—the group purposely excluded Margaret Mitchell.  As a result, collectors came up with an impressive array of poets, essayists, novelists, storytellers, and historians.  The highlighted Georgia authors are presented here in chronological order.

 

Thomas Holley Chivers (1809 – 1858)

Nacoochee: Or, The Beautiful Star, with Other Poems

Chivers, T. H.  Nacoochee: Or, The Beautiful Star, with Other Poems.  New York: W. E. Dean, Printer, 1837.  The author's third published collection of poetry.  This copy bears a presentation inscription from the author to the editor of The Sunday Morning News on the front free end paper.

"To the Editor of the Sunday Morning News.
Presented by the Author with his sincere respects."

Thomas Holley Chivers was born in Washington, Georgia, in 1809.  He trained as a physician but practiced medicine only briefly before turning to writing.  Chivers published ten books of poetry.  He has been called the "Lost Poet" of Georgia and has mostly been forgotten except for his friendship with Edgar Allan Poe.  Poe’s writing of "The Raven" was influenced by some of Chivers’s poetry.  He later traveled throughout many parts of the country, but always returned to Georgia.  Chivers is cited as an influence on Margaret Mitchell, and she intended to write a biography of him shortly before her death.

 

Maurice Thompson (1844 – 1901)

Stories of the Cherokee Hills

Thompson, Maurice.  Stories of the Cherokee Hills.  Boston: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1898.  A collection of seven fictional stories of both white and black Georgians, set mostly in the North Georgia mountains, spanning the slave days, the civil war, and the period of reconstruction.  This copy is signed by the author on the title page.

James Maurice Thompson moved with his family to Georgia as a young child and lived on his father’s plantation in the Cherokee Valley.  He and his brother become expert archers, hunting throughout Georgia from the Okefenokee Swamp to the north Georgia mountains and beyond.  His best-known book is The Witchery of Archery; the first edition of 1877 is extremely rare and very desirable by modern day archers.  He published 22 books in his lifetime, including books of poetry, novels, and essay collections.

 

Joel Chandler Harris (1848 – 1908)

Uncle Remus: His Songs and HIs Sayings

Harris, Joel Chandler.  Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings.  New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1898.  A collection of animal stories, folklore, and songs Harris learned as a teenager from the black storytellers he encountered at the Turnwold Plantation while working for The Countryman newspaper.  Harris constructed the Uncle Remus character to narrate the stories in the African American dialect in which he heard them.  This copy is inscribed by the author on the front free end paper.

"For Little Ruth: with the affectionate regards of Joel Chandler Harris"

Joel Chandler Harris was born in Eatonton, Georgia, in 1848.  He attended the Eatonton Academy for Boys, where one of his teachers later recalled his early writing ability.  He was a voracious reader of books and newspapers.  He began his writing career writing for the Macon Telegraph newspaper, though soon found that journalism did not satisfy his literary ambitions.  He later joined the writing staff of the Atlanta Constitution, where he was given an opportunity to take over a regular column which allowed him to write more creatively.  Harris's Uncle Remus stories first appeared in this newspaper column.  He published 10 collections of Uncle Remus and Mr. Rabbit stories; in total, he published 25 books in his lifetime plus 4 posthumous new works.  In 2000, Harris was inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame.

 

Harry Stillwell Edwards (1855 – 1938)

Eneas Africanus

Edwards, Harry Stillwell.  Eneas Africanus.  Macon, GA: Eneas Africanus Press, 1954.  Reprint.  First published in 1920, this pro-slavery propaganda story tells the story of Eneas, a former slave still faithful to his old master, George Tommey, who is sent out in search of "Tommeysville."  Eneas returns many years later with a family and all of Tommey's family treasures.

Edwards, Harry Stillwell.  Eneas Africanus.  Gatlinburg, TN: Historic Press \ South, n.d. (1973).  Facsimile reprint of the 1920 edition by J. W. Burke Company.

Harry Stillwell Edwards was born in Macon, Georgia, in 1855.  He earned his law degree from Mercer University in 1877 and was admitted to the bar but never practiced law, choosing to be a writer instead.  His early novels were mysteries which focused on Southern aristocratic families.  He turned his attention to journalism and became the co-owner/co-editor of the Macon Evening News and the owner/editor Macon Telegraph where he contributed a popular monthly column, "What Comes Down the Creek."  Writing later in the post-Reconstruction era, Edwards authored and self-published pro-slavery fantasies, propaganda literature still popular in the South at the time.  In all, he authored 19 novels and short story collections.

 

Erskine Caldwell (1903 – 1987)

You Have Seen Their Faces

Caldwell, Erskine and Margaret Bourke-White.  You Have Seen Their Faces.  New York: Viking Press, 1940.  Second edition.  First published in 1937, Caldwell wrote the social commentary for photographer Bourke-White's raw portraiture of the share-cropping South during the Great Depression.  The book is regarded as Bourke-White's most successful single work.  Caldwell's forceful commentary exemplifies his political sympathies with the working class; he often wrote stories of workers and farmers portraying their lives and struggles.  Caldwell and Bourke-White married two years after the book's publication.

Erskine Preston Caldwell was born in Moreland, Georgia, in 1903.  His father was a minister in the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, and Caldwell was profoundly influenced by his father's conservative, social reform theology and his parents' assistance to the poor in Wrens, Georgia, where his father pastored in Caldwell's teens.  He often wrote about poverty, racism, and social injustice in the American South.  These themes are prominent in his two most acclaimed works, Tobacco Road (1932) and God's Little Acre (1933).  Caldwell authored 25 novels, 12 nonfiction collections, 2 autobiographies, 2 children's books, and 150 short stories.  He also edited the 28-volume series American Folkways.  In 2000, Caldwell was inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame.

 

Kenneth Coleman (1916 – 1999)

The American Revolution in Georgia, 1763-1789

Coleman, Kenneth.  The American Revolution in Georgia, 1763-1789.  Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1958.  This revision of Coleman's doctoral dissertation provides a detailed description of the events leading up to the Revolutionary war, the years of fighting, and the readjustment after independence.  It analyzes the political, social, and economic impacts of the war throughout Georgia.  This copy is signed and dated on the title page.

Georgia Journeys, 1732-1754

Temple, Sarah Gober and Kenneth Coleman.  Georgia Journeys, 1732-1754.  Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1961.  Coleman and Temple use primary accounts of the original settlers of Georgia to trace the development of Georgia from the arrival of the original colonists in 1732 to England's takeover of the colony in 1754.  They focus on the problems and challenges encountered in establishing the colony, as described by the original and early settlers themselves.

Kenneth Coleman was born in Devereux, Georgia, in 1916.  He was a professor of history at the Atlanta Division of the University of Georgia (now Georgia State University) before moving to the main Athens campus of UGA in 1955.  He authored five books on colonial and revolutionary Georgia.  He served as the general editor and a contributor to A History of Georgia (1977), a project encouraged earlier by then-Governor Jimmy Carter.  He also edited six volumes (published between 1976 and 1989) of the 67-volume Colonial Records of Georgia and co-edited the 2-volume Dictionary of Georgia Biography (1983).  In 1992, Coleman received the Governor's Award in the Humanities, presented by Governor Zell Miller, who had been an undergraduate student of Coleman's.

 

Jimmy Carter (b. 1924)

Keeping Faith: Memoirs of a President

Carter, Jimmy.  Keeping Faith: Memoirs of a President.  New York: Bantam Books, 1982.  Carter's memoir of his time in the Oval Office is a candid glimpse into both the personal life and political world of the 39th President.  He details the highs and lows of his time in office, from the triumph of the Camp David Middle East peace summit to the frustrations of the Iran hostage crisis.  This edition is limited to 2,500 copies and is hand numbered and signed on the limitation page.

Numbered and signed limitation page

James Earl Carter, Jr. was born in Plains, Georgia, in 1924.  He began a life of public service with a stint in the Navy before serving two terms in the Georgia General Assembly.  He became the 76th Governor of Georgia in 1971 and the 39th President of the United States in 1977.  After leaving the White House, he and his wife, Rosalynn, founded the Carter Center, a nonpartisan public policy center promoting human rights and furthering the eradication of infectious diseases.  In 2002, Carter earned the Nobel Peace Prize for his work with the Carter Center.  He has authored 32 books and co-authored one book with his wife, Rosalynn, and one book with his daughter, Amy.  In 2006, Carter was inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame.

 

Flannery O'Connor (1925 – 1964)

The Complete Stories

O’Connor, Flannery.  The Complete Stories.  New York: Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, 1971.  Posthumously published, this short story collection comprises the stories from A Good Man Is Hard to Find (1955) and Everything That Rises Must Converge (1965), along with several previously unavailable stories. The Complete Stories won the National Book Award for Fiction 1972.

Mary Flannery O'Connor was born in Savannah, Georgia, in 1925.  She attended high school in Milledgeville, Georgia, where she worked as the art editor for the school newspaper.  While attending Georgia State College for Women, she drew cartoons for the student newspaper.  After college, she attended the Iowa Writers' Workshop where she met Andrew Lytle, who first published her stories in the Sewanee Review.  She published two novels and one short story collection during her short lifetime; a second short story collection was published shortly after her death.  Posthumously, seven books have been published containing her letters, book reviews, journal entries, cartoons, and short prose.  In 2000, Flannery O'Connor was inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame.

 

Terry Kay (1938 – 2020)

To Dance With the White Dog

Kay, Terry.  To Dance With the White Dog.  Atlanta: Peachtree Publishers, Ltd., 1993.  Fifth printing.  First published in 1990, the novel began as a nonfiction celebration of Kay's parents' marriage.  Kay's father was visited by a white dog after his wife's death, and Kay decided to fictionalize his parent's long, loving relationship and the event with the white dog to tell a universal love story.  The novel was adapted to a Hallmark Hall of Fame television movie in 1993 starring Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy, for which Cronyn won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or Movie.  This copy is signed by the author on the title page.

Terry Kay was born in Royston, Georgia, in 1938.  He began his career as a writer and critic for the Dekalb Decatur News and the Atlanta Journal before becoming a novelist.  His first novel, The Year the Lights Came On, was published in 1976; his second novel, After Eli (1981) earned him the Georgia Writer's Association award for Author of the Year.  To Dance with the White Dog garnered Kay the Southeastern Library Association's Outstanding Author of the Year distinction in 1991, and the book was twice nominated for the American Booksellers Association's Book of the Year award.  He authored 14 novels, a juvenile Christmas story, 2 nonfiction books, a play, a teleplay, as well as the adaptations of three of his novels to film.  In 2006, Kay was inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame.

 

Alice Walker (b. 1944)

The Temple of My Familiar

Walker, Alice.  The Temple of My Familiar.  San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1989.  First edition.  Walker's fifth novel interweaves stories of its five central characters; it is told through multi-perspective narration as each character tells her or his own story.  Celie and Shug, the main characters of The Color Purple (1982), Walker's third and best-known novel, appear as supporting characters, though The Temple of My Familiar is not a sequel.  This copy is signed and dated by the author on the half title page.

Alice Walker was born in Eatonton, Georgia, in 1944.  She attended segregated schools there through high school and graduated as class valedictorian from the only Black high school in the town.  Much of her fiction, like The Temple of My Familiar and The Color Purple (1982), takes place in unnamed Southern places which resemble her middle Georgia upbringing.  The Color Purple earned her the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award for Fiction.  She has published 13 novels and short story collections, 11 poetry collections, and 11 nonfiction books.  In 2001, Walker was inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame.

 

Michael Bishop (1945 – 2023)

No Enemy But Time

Bishop, Michael.  No Enemy But Time.  New York: Timescape/Simon & Schuster, 1982.  John Monegal (aka Joshua Kampa), a black American who regularly has intense dreams of prehistoric Africa, is invited to join a top-secret government time travel project.  He is sent back millions of years into the past to central Africa, where he joins a tribe of protohumans.  When he returns to his present-day reality, the reader is left with an unanswered question: was it time travel or a dream?  No Enemy But Time won the 1982 Nebula Award for Best Novel.

Brittle Innings

Bishop, Michael.  Brittle Innings.  New York: Bantam Books, 1994.  Brittle Innings is a sequel of sorts to Frankenstein.  Frankenstein's monster makes his way to the American South during World War II and joins a minor league baseball team in Georgia.  The story confronts racism, misogyny, and other social ills against the backdrop of war while also enjoying the great American pastime.  Brittle Innings won the 1995 Locus Award for Best Fantasy Novel.

Michael Lawson Bishop lived most of his adult life in Pine Mountain, Georgia.  He earned his Bachelor and Master of Arts degrees in English from the University of Georgia.  He joined its English department faculty in 1972, but two years later devoted himself to writing full time.  Georgia is a frequent setting for Bishop's fiction; several of his novels and short stories take place throughout present-day Georgia while others occur in futuristic Atlanta.  He won multiple writing awards including 2 Nebula Awards, the Locus Award, and the Shirley Jackson Award.  He authored 15 solo novels, 3 collaborative novels, 11 story collections, 2 poetry collections, over 150 pieces of short fiction, and many essays.  In 2018, Bishop was inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame.

 

Becky Albertalli (b. 1982)

Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda

Albertalli, Becky.  Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda.  New York: Balzer + Bray, 2015.  First edition.  Albertalli's debut novel tells the story of Simon and his online relationship with "Blue," another student at his high school who has not yet revealed his identity.  In a climactic scene, Blue finally reveals himself as a known character throughout the story.  Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda was adapted to film as Love, Simon in 2018, starring Nick Robinson as Simon and Keiynan Lonsdale as Bram/"Blue."  The movie was filmed in multiple locations throughout the Atlanta metropolitan area.  This copy is signed by the author on the title page.

Becky Albertalli was born in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1982.  She and her family still reside in the Atlanta metropolitan area.  A former psychologist, she left her practice in 2012 with the birth of her first son and decided to pursue writing as a career.  Her first novel, Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda, was published three years later.  Simon earned Albertalli the 2105 William C. Morris Award from the American Library Association and the 2017 German Youth Literature Prize.  She has published 9 novels, 3 of which were co-authored with other writers.  In addition to Simon being adapted to film, the movie rights to two of her other novels have been purchased and are in development.

 

Taylor Brown (b. 1982)

Wingwalkers

Brown, Taylor.  Wingwalkers.  New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2022.  This fictional story is inspired by an anecdote in William Faulkner's biography, in which Faulkner meets two barnstormers funding their cross-country journey by performing daredevil arial shows.  Brown follows his biplane pilot, Zeno, and his wingwalking wife, Della, as they cheat death along the way from Georgia to Hollywood, where Della dreams of living.  The novel builds up to their chance meeting with Faulkner in New Orleans.

Taylor Brown was born in Brunswick, Georgia, in 1982.  He grew up on the Georgia coast and attended the University of Georgia.  After some international travel, he settled in Savannah, Georgia.  He published his first short stories in 2008.  He has published six novels and one short story collection.  He is a recipient of the Montana Prize for Fiction and has been a finalist for several writing awards, including being a three-time finalist for the Southern Book Prize.  In 2021, Taylor Brown was named Georgia Author of the Year by the Georgia Writers Association.

 

November 2023: Shakespeare

Title page of the First Folio (facsimile)

In November 1623, the first printing of Mr. William Shakespeare’s Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies was completed.  Commonly known as the First Folio, this collection of 36 of Shakespeare’s plays was assembled and published 7 years after the Bard's death by his friends and fellow thespians John Heminge and Henry Condell to preserve and commemorate these great works.  Half of the plays had not been previously published, and it is believed that many of them would have been lost or forgotten completely had it not been for the efforts of Heminge and Condell.  The First Folio not only immortalized William Shakespeare but is considered one of the most influential books ever published.  Only 750 copies were originally printed, and only 235 copies are known to remain.

To commemorate the 400th anniversary of the First Folio, the November 2023 meeting was devoted to Shakespeare.  Members presented books either by or about William Shakespeare.  While no members of the Atlanta Antiquarian Book Circle possess a First Folio (or a Second, Third, or Fourth Folio for that matter), one member shared a scarce copy of the first photolithographic facsimile of the First Folio published in 1866.

The Works of William Shakespeare

Facsimile of the First Folio (Day & Son, 1866)

Shakespeare, William.  Shakespeare: The First Collected Edition of the Dramatic Works of William Shakespeare: A Reproduction in Exact Facsimile of the Famous First Folio, 1623, by the Newly-Discovered Process of Photo-Lithography.  London: Day & Son, 1866.  This facsimile was produced under the supervision of Howard Staunton (1810-1874), an English chess master and Shakespeare scholar/editor.  It was the first true facsimile ever created; previous printers had only been able to approximate page-for-page reprints using close-to-original typeface.

A Catalogue of the several Comedies,
Histories, and Tragedies contained in this volume

Staunton’s facsimile was issued serially to subscribers in 16 parts between 1864 and 1866; complete sets were then individually custom bound by the owners.  The quantity of copies printed is unknown but believed to be small.  The remaining quires which were not sold serially were bound by Day & Son bearing a contemporary interpretation of the Shakespeare coat of arms in gilt on the front cover and sold on the 250th anniversary of Shakespeare's death.  Copies in the publisher’s binding are rare.  This copy bears some amateur repair work but maintains the original armorial binding.

Sample page, from Romeo & Juliet

The Works of Shakespeare

Shakespeare, William.  The Works of Shakespeare.  London: J. M. Dent & Co., 1899.  Edited by Israel Gollancz.  Complete in 12 volumes.  This illustrated set was uniformly bound in brown leather with gilt lettering and ornamentation and serially issued from 1899 to 1904.  Gollancz's edited The Works of Shakespeare became the definitive text of Shakespeare’s plays, poems, and sonnets for the Twentieth Century and is still used today.

Title page of Volume 1

Israel Gollancz (1863-1930) was a professor of English Language and Literature at King's College, London, and a scholar of early English literature and of Shakespeare, in particular.  He later published a 40-volume uniform edition of the complete works of Shakespeare in pocket-size volumes, known as the "Temple" Shakespeare, which was the most popular Shakespeare edition of its day.  As Honorary Secretary of the Shakespeare Tercentenary Committee, in 1916, Gollancz edited A Book of Homage to Shakespeare, an anthology of responses to Shakespeare by an international panel of scholars, thinkers, and prominent figures of the time.  

 

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare

Shakespeare, William.  The Complete Works of William Shakespeare.  Philadelphia: The Shakespeare Club, n.d. (circa 1905).  Garrick Edition.  With a preface, glossary, etc., by Israel Gollancz.  Complete in 10 volumes.  Uniformly bound in brown leather.  An American edition of Gollancz's The Works of Shakespeare (above).  Volume I contains a biography of Shakespeare along with the first three comedies.  Volumes II though IX contain the comedies, histories, and tragedies.  Volume X contains the last 2 tragedies along with Shakespeare's poems and sonnets.

Title page of Volume 1

 

Tales from Shakespeare

Lamb, Charles and Mary Lamb.  Tales from Shakespeare.  Westminster: Archibald Constable & Co., 1903.  Introductory Preface by Andrew Lang.  Illustrations by Robert Anning Bell.  The Lambs' retelling of Shakespeare's plays for young readers is as imitation of Tales from Shakespeare (1807) by Thomas Hodgkins.  In paraphrasing and redesigning Shakespeare for youth, the Lambs copy the blank verse unaltered but not printed as verse.  They hope "to cheat the young readers into the belief that they are reading prose."  The Tales "are meant to be submitted to the young reader as an introduction to the study of Shakespeare, for which purpose his words are used wherever it seemed possible to bring them in" (preface).

Illustration by Robert Anning Bell

 

More Stories from Shakespeare

Chisholm, Louey, ed.  More Stories from Shakespeare.  New York: E. P. Dutton, n.d. (circa 1900).  Part of a series of classic literature retold for children, published in the early 1900s.  This is the second of the Shakespeare titles.

 

The Annotated Shakespeare

Shakespeare, William.  The Annotated Shakespeare.  New York: Clarkson N. Potter, Inc., 1978.  Edited, with Introductions, Notes, a Biography, and Bibliography by A. L. Rowse.  Complete in 3 volumes.  Alfred Leslie Rowse (1903-1997) was a poet and Elizabethan historian.  Late in his career, he turned his attention to Shakespeare, authoring 9 books on the Bard.  He made bold claims and "discoveries" about both Shakespeare's life and works, often failing to cite other scholars and dismissing their critiques of his views.  In Shakespeare the Man (1978), he even claimed to solve the identity of the "Dark Lady" of Shakespeare’s sonnets, an assertion rejected by most scholars.  Many of Rowse's questionable and disproved "discoveries" can be found in The Annotated Shakespeare.  This set, in very good condition, includes the publisher's slipcase and each volume retains its dust jacket.

 

Books About Shakespeare and his Works

A Short Life of Shakespeare with the Sources

Williams, Charles. A Short Life of Shakespeare with the Sources. London: Oxford University Press, 1933.  An abridgement of William Shakespeare: A Study of Facts and Problems (1930), in 2 volumes, by Edmund Chambers.  Charles Williams (1886-1945) was a poet and novelist who late in his career moved to Oxford where he joined the Inklings, C. S. Lewis's literary society.  In addition to abridging Chambers's tome, Williams wrote a play about Shakespeare, A Myth of Shakespeare (1930), and profiled the playwright in his Stories of Great Names (1937).

 

Coined by Shakespeare

McQuain, Jeffrey and Stanley Malless.  Coined by Shakespeare: Words & Meanings First Penned by the Bard.  Springfield, MA: Merriam Webster, 1998.  A dictionary with 208 entries of words or phrases first used by William Shakespeare.  Where similar books focus on oft-repeated unusual phrases and familiar quotations from Shakespeare, Coined by Shakespeare focuses on what are now ordinary words common to the English lexicon, such as excitement, marketable, quarrelsome, discontent, lackluster, reinforcement, and never-ending.  McQuain and Malless cite the play where the word is first used and trace subtle shifts in its meaning from Shakespeare's intended meaning within the context of the play to its usage today.  The book also contains a chronology of Shakespeare's plays and quizzes about those works.

 

Will in the World

Greenblatt, Stephen.  Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare.  New York: W. W. Norton, 2004.  Greenblatt (b. 1943) is an American Shakespearian historian who has authored five books on Shakespeare as well as editing The Norton Shakespeare (2015).  Greenblatt's biography explores significant events, people, and circumstances in Shakespeare's own life and shows where these personal details show up in his plays.  Greenblatt, for example, delves into the death of Shakespeare's own son, Hamnet, in 1596, and then shows where Shakespeare seemingly writes through his grief in the deaths of several plays' characters, most notably Ophelia’s burial ceremony in Hamlet (1600-1601), which Greenblatt calls "the most famous burial scene in literature."  When published, Will in the World was quickly acclaimed by both scholars and general readers, attracting more readers than other contemporary books on Shakespeare.  It was a finalist for the 2004 National Book Award for Nonfiction.

 

The Book of William

Collins, Paul.  The Book of William: How Shakespeare’s First Folio Conquered the World.  New York: Bloomsbury, 2009.  Collins (b. 1969) traces the history of the First Folio through time and place to show how it has been received across centuries and culture to become the "immortal" text and one of the most influential booked ever printed.  He considers the humble transfer of the book through the generations of a family to the astronomical prices garnered by Sotheby’s auction house.  He explores the Eighteenth and Nineteenth century quests for lost copies of the First Folio and modern-day hunts for unknown, yet-to-be-discovered copies. 

 

Shakespeare: The Illustrated Updated Edition

Bryson, Bill.  Shakespeare: The Illustrated Update Edition.  New York: Harper, 2009.  Bill Bryson (b. 1951), a journalist and nonfiction author, first published Shakespeare: The World as Stage in 2007.  The biography explored the social, cultural, and political context of Shakespeare's work.  It also attempted to separate fact from fiction about Shakespeare's life, teasing out known and provable facts from myths, theories, and unprovable lore.  This aspect of Bryson's biography drew much attention and resulted in a need to update the text.  The updated and illustrated edition was released two years later as interest in the book remained strong.