AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY
New York: Boni and Liveright, 1925. First Edition. A presentable copy of Dreiser's most enduring novel, in which a young man makes a tragic and ill-fated attempt to break from his lower-class background. Fleeing Kansas City from a crime he didn't commit, he settles in a fictional New York town, where torn between a farm girl he impregnates and a socialite he becomes infatuated with, he unintentionally kills his pregnant girlfriend, is arrested, tried, and ultimately sent to the electric chair. A Haycraft-Queen Cornerstone title, and basis for two film adaptations – Josef von Sternberg's pre-Code film An American Tragedy (1931), and George Stevens's 1951 film noir A Place In The Sun, starring Montgomery Clift, Elizabeth Taylor, and Shelley Winters. McDonald 18A; Hubin, p.123; Selby 308. Item #5664
First Printing. Two octavo volumes (19.5cm); black cloth, with titling and author's stylized initials stamped in gilt on spines and front covers; dustjackets; [viii],431,[1]; [x],409,[1]pp. Upper text edges lightly dust-soiled with a few tiny scuffs, a handful of tiny punctures along rear joint on Vol.2, else contents are fresh, with hinges sound; Near Fine. Dustjackets are unclipped (priced $5.00), gently spine-sunned and lightly dust-soiled, with a few tiny nicks and tears to extremities, shallow loss to spine ends on Vol.2, and a neat 2" split at upper flap fold of Vol.1; unrestored, Very Good+ examples. Lacking the publisher's cardboard slipcase.
Price: $1,250.00