Landmark Books in All Fields
ItemID: #124971
Cost: $6,200.00

Deaths and Entrances

Dylan Thomas

"NOW AS I WAS YOUNG AND EASY UNDER THE APPLE BOUGHS…": DYLAN THOMAS' DEATHS AND ENTRANCES, INSCRIBED PRESENTATION COPY

THOMAS, Dylan. Deaths and Entrances. London: J.M. Dent & Sons, (1949). Square 12mo, original orange cloth, original dust jacket. Housed in a custom half morocco clamshell box. $6200.

Early printing, inscribed over the front free endpaper: "From Dylan with love to David. Goody's Party. 1950, NY."

Death and Entrances, whose title was taken from Donne's sermon, Deaths Duell (1630), established Thomas' reputation at "the first great civilian war poet" (Ackerman, Dylan Thomas Companion, 106). Published just after the end of WWII, it is a "deeply moving work inspired by the horrific scenes he had witnessed in London during bombing raids" (Ellis, Dylan Thomas, 198). Featuring "some of the best war poetry (from the home front) and Thomas' incantatory descriptions of his childhood," this volume of 24 poems combines Thomas' "romantic, regional and religious standpoint… with his surrealist manipulation of language to produce his greatest work" (Connolly, Modern Movement, 91-2). Featured are poems such as "Fern Hill," "A Refusal to Mourn the Death, by Fire, of a Child in London," "Poem in October," "The Hunchback in the Park" and "In My Craft or Sullen Art." Inscribed to poet David Lougée, best known for editing a 1969 edition of Pope's "The Rape of the Lock." First published in 1946.

Book about fine. Small stain to upper edge of dust jacket front panel, rear panel with a chip to upper corner and some paint-staining; very good condition.

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