Available Copies from Independent Booksellers
Price: US$15.00 + shipping
Condition: Good
Description: Good Cond, bit soil to cover PAPERBACK; 44pg pages; "Best Minds Of My Generation".NUMBER FOUR Pocket Poets series. NOTE****This PRINTING is last one with stapled spine. Later were perfect bound***
Seller: WONDERFUL BOOKS BY MAIL, Durham-CA, CA, U.S.A.
Ginsberg, Allen.. Howl and Other Poems.. City Lights Books [1956], San Francisco, 1956.
Price: US$345.00 + shipping
Condition: Near Fine
Description: The Fourth Printing, undated. Issued as Number 4 in the publisher's Pocket Poets Series. Cook 3. About Fine in black and white stapled wrappers. Small smooth crease lower front corner. 44pp. with Introduction by William Carlos Williams. Q19756
Seller: Compass Rose Books, ABAA-ILAB, Kensington, CA, U.S.A.
Price: US$350.00 + shipping
Description: Broadside (14" x 22"), printed in red and blue on white card stock. In addition to writing poetry, Margolis was the editor/publisher of the Miscellaneous Man, a Beat Generation magazine and lesser known defendant in the 1957 obscenity trial which made Allen Ginsberg's Howl famous. A month before they seized Howl, U.S. Customs officials seized Safford Chamberlain's story "Our Kind of Love," which was published in the magazine's 10th issue (January 1957). This, along with Gil Orlovitz's The Statement of Erika Keith and Other Stories, Poems, and a Play (Miscellaneous Man, Numbers 11-12) and Howl, which were purchased at City Lights Bookstore by plainclothes police officers, were at the heart of the obscenity trial. Leslie Woolf Hedley (1921-2013), an accomplished writer and poet, was the publisher of the other sponsor of this reading, inferno. The Bay Area poetry journal was printed in eleven issues in the 1950s. The Town Hall Theatre was in operation from 1955 to 1959. It is best known as the location on March 18, 1956 where the earliest known recordings of "Howl" was made. The broadside was likely posted to advertise the event. It has the remnants of non-archival scotch tape in two spots, a bit of staining, and some general wear. A rare survivor with no copies recorded in OCLC or available in the marketplace.
Seller: johnson rare books & archives, ABAA, Covina, CA, U.S.A.
Price: US$856.31 + shipping
Description: 44 pp Second edition of the book, also in 1956, the first year of publication. Identical to first edition despite "second edition" printed in blue on the back of the book and the missign mention of Lucien Carr in the dedication. Printed in England at the Press of Villiers Publications, Holloway, London. Very fine copy with only slight yellowed back due to age. Someone presented the book to the pre-owner and wrote a dedication on page three (title page). Please feel free to ask for images. Sprache: Englisch Gewicht in Gramm: 550
Seller: Antiquariat Willi Braunert, München, Germany
Price: US$3500.00 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: First edition, first printing, first issue with Lucien Carr listed on the dedication page and a period after Harlem on the rear cover. Publisher's black wraps printed in blue with white wraparound printed in black. Very Good. Wraps toned and slightly wavy, former owner name to copyright page, pages toned. An undisputed cornerstone of beat poetry, Ginsberg's initial inspiration came from a terrifying vision he had during a San Francisco peyote trip. The poem defined a generation.
Seller: Burnside Rare Books, ABAA, Portland, OR, U.S.A.
Price: US$4000.00 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: First edition, first issue with Lucien Carr listed on the dedication page and a period after Harlem on the rear cover. Publisher's black wraps printed in blue with white wraparound printed in black. Very Good. toning and light soiling to wraps, bottom corner lightly bumped. An undisputed cornerstone of beat poetry, Ginsberg's initial inspiration came from a terrifying vision he had during a San Francisco peyote trip. The poem defined a generation.
Seller: Burnside Rare Books, ABAA, Portland, OR, U.S.A.
Price: US$4000.00 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: First edition, first issue with Lucien Carr listed on the dedication page and a period after Harlem on the rear cover. Publisher's black wraps printed in blue with white wraparound printed in black. Near Fine with toning, light lifting to bottom corner of wrap-around band at rear cover, former owner name and date to title page, small area of wear at staple and verso of front wrap, pages lightly thumbed. An undisputed cornerstone of beat poetry, Ginsberg's initial inspiration came from a terrifying vision he had during a San Francisco peyote trip. The poem defined a generation.
Seller: Burnside Rare Books, ABAA, Portland, OR, U.S.A.
Price: US$7500.00 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: This is a very good copy of the true First State of the First Edition (with the name "Lucien Carr" ?later removed ?on the dedication page). There is some faint staining to the white front cover panel and to the title page, which is SIGNED and dated in ink: "Allen Ginsberg, ?74" beneath a drawing by Ginsberg of the sun and a large flower that utilizes the "O" in "Howl" as its corolla. Perhaps the most important volume of American poetry of the twentieth century, signed and uniquely decorated by the author. First Edition/First State (1 of 1000 copies).
Seller: CHARTWELL BOOKSELLERS, NEW YORK, NY, U.S.A.
Price: US$25000.00 + shipping
Description: First Edition. Signed by the author Allen Ginsberg and dated by him in the year of publication: ÒAllen Ginsberg Sept. 8, 1956.Ó With an inscription just below from Ginsberg to Beat collector and photographer Marshall Clements: ÒFor Marshall Clements much thanks for the relief. A.G. New Years Month, Jan. 7, 1964.Ó Also signed by Marshall Clements at the top of the same page, the bookÕs dedication page. City Lights Pocket Poets Series: Number Four. With the two page introduction by William Carlos Williams. Paperbound, stapled black and white wrappers. With a faint hint of dust soiling to the covers, else a fine copy. Price 75 cents on rear cover. Printed at the Press of Villiers Publications, Holloway, London, England. Enclosed in a custom slipcase with ÒHowl. Allen GinsbergÓ on a paper label affixed to the front and with the same at the spine. Marshall Clements was a noted collector and scholar of Beat Generation works and was the photographer for ÔKerouac's TownÕ by Barry Gifford (1977) - a special look at Jack KerouacÕs hometown of Lowell, Massachusetts, published on the second anniversary of his death.
Seller: James Pepper Rare Books, Inc., ABAA, Santa Barbara, CA, U.S.A.
Ginsberg, Allen. Howl and Other Poems. City Lights Pocket Bookshop, San Francisco, 1956.
Price: US$35000.00 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: First edition, first issue with Lucien Carr listed on the dedication page and a period after Harlem on the rear cover. Signed by Allen Ginsberg and inscribed to a former owner on the title page; additionally signed by this book's publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti on the copyright page, and by William S. Burroughs, Carl Solomon and Gregory Corso on the dedication page. Bound in publisher's original stapled black wraps printed in grey with with white paste-on printed in black. Very Good with light toning and light rubbing to covers with a small abrasion to the top right of the front cover of the white paste-on. Pencil notations to text. The poem that defined a generation and an undisputed cornerstone of beat poetry, signed by five heavy-weights of that era.
Seller: Burnside Rare Books, ABAA, Portland, OR, U.S.A.
Price: US$50000.00 + shipping
Condition: Near Fine
Description: A remarkable Association copy of the 1956 correct 1st edition. This copy not only conforms to all the original issue points but is in beautiful, near-pristine condition. Furthermore, THIS COPY IS SIGNED BY 5 OF THE KEY FIGURES IN THE BOOK'S GENESIS: 1) ALLEN GINSBERG (on the title page); 2) LAWRENCE FERLINGHETTI (on the copyright page); 3) LUCIEN CARR (on the dedication page); 4) WILLIAM BURROUGHS (also on the dedication page); and 5) CARL SOLOMON (on the first blank endpaper). In other words, this copy is signed by the book's author, its publisher and by 3 of its 5 dedicatees (only Jack Kerouac's and Neal Cassady's signatures are missing from this copy). Notably, of the 5 signatures, all critically important to the birth and evolution of "Howl", Lucien Carr's appears to be the most elusive. We know that Carr's relationship with the Beats grew tense early on and that he insisted his name be removed from all subsequent printings of "Howl". We also know that Carr himself introduced William Burroughs (an old friend from their St. Louis upbringing) to Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg --and that Carr's infamous career at Columbia (as documented in the 2013 film "Kill Your Darlings") saw him as a very important muse to this budding literary scene. A fresh, tight copy, immaculate internally and easily Near Fine overall, while legitimately approaching Fine (even down to its unrusted staple). Also includes a hand-made chemise (signed by Ginsberg at a later date), a folded cardboard reproduction of the book's front cover which, among other things, capably protects the fragile 1st edition and no doubt helps to explain its remarkable condition. Of the 1,000 copies of "Howl" initially published, this must certainly rank as among the very most historic and significant.
Seller: APPLEDORE BOOKS, ABAA, WACCABUC, NY, U.S.A.