FIRST EDITION OF ESSAYS OF E.B. WHITE, INSCRIBED BY E.B. WHITE
WHITE, E.B. Essays of E.B. White. New York: Harper and Row, (1977). Octavo, original burgundy cloth, original dust jacket.
First edition of these self-selected essays of E.B. White, inscribed: "Ethel Marx with greetings from E.B. White."
The essays in this collection were selected by White himself. "I have chosen the ones that have amused me in the rereading, along with a few that seemed to have the odor of durability clinging to them" (Author's Foreword). "Some of the finest examples of contemporary, genuinely American prose. White's style incorporates eloquence without affection, profundity without pomposity, and wit without frivolity or hostility. Like his predecessors Thoreau and Twain, White's creative, humane, and graceful perceptions are an education for the sensibilities" (Washington Post). "His voice rumbles with authority through sentences of surpassing grace. In his more than 50 years at The New Yorker, White set a standard of writerly craft for that supremely well-wrought magazine. In genial, perfectly poised essay after essay, he has wielded the English language with as much clarity and control as any American of his time" (Newsweek).
Book with light foxing to edges of text block and faint foxing to original cloth, dust jacket with only slightest rubbing to extremities and mild toning to spine. A near-fine inscribed copy.