"SPOKANE IS FOREVER NAILED TO THE WALL OF MY MEMORY, CRACKING THE PLASTER, BUT THE PICTURE HANGS": FIRST EDITION OF SOMETIMES A GREAT NOTION, BOLDLY INSCRIBED BY KEN KESEY
KESEY, Ken. Sometimes a Great Notion. New York: Viking, (1964). Octavo, original gray cloth, original dust jacket.
First edition, first issue, of Kesey’s second novel, movingly inscribed by him the same year his son Jed died in a Spokane hospital after a tragic accident, "For J— C—: Yes, J—, I remember you, and your daughter. Spokane is forever nailed to the wall of my memory, cracking the plaster, but the picture hangs, Ken Kesey 1984."
Following the success of his first novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1962), Kesey, in this work about an Oregon logging family, "aimed higher than many of his contemporaries, and… [came] impressively close to his target" (Vinson, 754) "The novel's exquisite prose, which often reads like lyric poetry, draws us into the daily lives of the Stamper family… We've heard Sometimes described as a novel about a family feud. That's like saying War and Peace is about one of Napoleon's shorter-lived military campaigns. Each of the Stampers is a three-dimensional person, and that leads to some fun, some heartache and a great literary catharsis" (Henley, Wikelund & Lindquist, 39). Kesey's novel was adapted to the screen in 1971 by Paul Newman, who both directed and starred in the film. First issue, with publisher's logo on half title page, in first-state dust jacket with author photo credited to Hank Krangler on rear flap. Bruccoli & Clark I:221. Kesey's inscription is dated the same year his beloved 20-year-old son Jed died in a Spokane hospital following a bus accident on an icy mountain road.
Book fine; light edge-wear, small faint trace of tape removal to front flap of near-fine dust jacket.