FIRST ENGLISH EDITION OF ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENISOVICH, INSCRIBED BY ALEXANDER SOLZHENITSYN

SOLZHENITSYN, Alexander. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich. Translated by Ralph Parker. London: Gollancz, 1963. Octavo, original red cloth, original dust jacket.    $12,000.

First English edition of Solzhenitsyn’s first published work, inscribed in English and signed in Cyrillic on the title page: “to —- March 2005 Alexander Solzhenitsyn.”

Causing an immediate scandal when published in the Soviet Union in 1962 for its frank portrayal of life under Soviet rule, this novel propelled its author to international fame. It is the first and perhaps the best example of this Nobel laureate’s belief in “the indivisibility of truth and ‘the perception of world literature as the one great heart which beats for the concerns and misfortunes of our world’” (Solzhenitsyn, Nobel acceptance speech, 1970). This London edition published the same year as the American, which preceded it by only a few months.

Only slightest rubbing to extremities of fragile dust jacket. A most exceptional inscribed copy.