July 2022 Catalogue

Black Americana and Abolition – 15 – Bauman Rare Books - July 2022 Signed By Octavia Butler 22. BUTLER, Octavia. Dawn Xenogenesis. New York, 1987. Octavo, original half navy cloth, dust jacket. $2800. First of the visionary first novel in Butler’s innovative Xenogenesis trilogy, boldly signed by her. Dawn, the first novel in Butler’s Xenogenesis trilogy (aka Lilith’s Brood), begins hundreds of years after a global nuclear holocaust and is centered around a Lilith Iyapo, a Black woman who awakens from suspended animation to find herself held captive on an interplanetary ship of the Oankali, aliens who practice gene trading to exchange genetic information with other species. To Library of America editor Gerry Caravan, “she seems to have seen the real future coming in a way few other writers did” (USA Today). Book fine; only tiny bit of edge-wear to about-fine dust jacket. Very Scarce Advance Review Copy, Inscribed By Octavia Butler 23. BUTLER, Octavia. Survivor. Garden City, 1978. Octavo, original yellow paper boards, dust jacket. $4800. First edition of the rarest book in Butler’s Patternmaster series, advance review copy with laidin publisher’s slip, inscribed: “To J— Best Wishes Octavia E. Butler.” Butler links science fiction “directly to the Black American slavery experiences via the slave narrative. This is a fundamental departure for SF as a genre” (Govan, 79). Survivor is the only one in the series to deflect its main architecture, serving as a bridge between Mind of My Mind (1977) and Clay’s Ark (1984). Containing laid-in ARC slip dated in typescript: “March 24, 1978.” Fine condition.

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