Available Copies from Independent Booksellers
Patricia Highsmith SIGNED. Strangers on a Train. Cresset Press, UK, 1950.
Price: US$768.52 + shipping
Condition: Fine
Description: 1st Edition 1950. Tipped in signed slip attached to the title page. Correct 1st state book confirming to all points. Bound in full leather with elaborate tooling and gilt work. Hand marbled endpapers. Page tops with gold gilt. Wonderful production quality. Book is fine and in very nice condition. Contents good. More images available upon request. RefA1234
Seller: Lasting Words Ltd, Northampton, UK, United Kingdom
HIGHSMITH, Patricia. Strangers on a Train. The Cresset Press, London, 1950.
Price: US$1000.00 + shipping
Condition: Near Fine
Description: First English edition. A touch of rubbing to the base of the spine and the publisher's name just above it, else fine, but lacking the dust jacket. Author's ingenious first novel in which two potential murderers exchange victims in order to provide alibis for each other, it established the author as a master of psychological suspense and was the basis for the memorable film adaptation by Alfred Hitchcock. She followed it with her equally successful *The Talented Mr. Ripley*.
Seller: Between the Covers-Rare Books, Inc. ABAA, Gloucester City, NJ, U.S.A.
HIGHSMITH PATRICIA. Strangers on a Train. Cresset, London, 1950.
Price: US$1793.21 + shipping
Description: (London: The Cresset Press 1950). First UK Edition. Publisher's blue boards with gilt lettering to the front board and spine. Just the merest hint of foxing to the page block edges otherwise a lovely, bright and clean VG+ copy. The D/W designed by J Yunge-Bateman is priced 10/6 to the inside flap as called for. The D/W has the wide flaps required by the first edition. The D/W is has a clean back panel with a small patch of insignificant surface loss to the left hand edge and the red spine is now a lighter hue of red (but not as far as burnt orange seen on other copies which have suffered much more). The D/W has had NO RESTORATION and is NOT PRICE-CLIPPED and is a totally honest example in perfectly shelvable condition. Formerly owned by the late, great bookseller George Locke (Ferret Fantasy). Famously filmed in 1951 and directed by Alfred Hitchcock starring Farley Granger as Guy Haines, Robert Walker as Bruno Anthony, Ruth Roman as Anne Morton, Kasey Rogers as Miriam Haines, First book. Scans/photographs available upon request.
Seller: James M Pickard, ABA, ILAB, PBFA., LEICESTER, United Kingdom
Highsmith, Patricia. Strangers on a Train. -Cresset Press -, 1950.
Price: US$2049.38 + shipping
Description: First UK edition, 1950. Her first book. Cloth. A particularly nice copy, pages clean and unmarked, blue cloth bright with only minute shelf-wear to tail of the spine. Very good indeed in minor edge-worn dustjacket with some sunning to spine, and some very small closed tears. I have just catalogued 49 Patricia Highsmith first editions and proof copies from my own collection. Please ask for a list if you are also a collector.
Seller: Paul Brown, Ramsgate, United Kingdom
HIGHSMITH (Patricia). Strangers on a train. London, The Cresset Press, 1950, 1950.
Price: US$2192.51 + shipping
Condition: Fine
Description: In-12 (18,5 x 12 cm), cartonnage éditeur bleu, jaquette illustrée, 306 pp., 1 f. n. ch. Première édition anglaise du premier et plus célèbre roman de l'auteur porté à l'écran en 1951 par Alfred Hitchcock, d'après une adaptation de Raymond Chandler. Exemplaire de la journaliste américaine Janet Flanner (1892-1978), correspondante du New Yorker à Paris, avec une note autographe de celle-ci au crayon sur le premier rabat de la jaquette : "Janet Flanner / gift of / author". Patricia Highsmith fit la connaissance de Janet Flanner et de sa compagne Natalia Danesi Murray à l'occasion de son voyage en Europe début 1951. Flanner et Murray furent alors d'un grand soutien financier pour la jeune écrivaine désargentée. Janet Flanner disait d'elle : "She has talent." Quelques jours avant le départ de Janet pour les Etats-Unis en mai 1951, Patricia Highsmith écrivit dans son journal : "How like a schmuck I feel in comparison to her - and in accordance with my perverse nature, I am immediately better (more open in every way) as soon as she is gone, while all I should have liked to do was please her". Strangers on a train fut traduit en italien par Ester Danesi, mère de Natalia, et parut chez Bompiani en 1954. (Joan Shenkar, The Talented Miss Highsmith: The Secret Life and Serious Art of Patricia, pp. 307 à 308) Bel exemplaire, complet de sa jaquette en très bel état en dépit d'infimes déchirures en haut du dos. First edition. First U. K. edition of her first and best known novel brilliantly filmed by Alfred Hitchcock, from a screenplay written in large part by Raymond Chandler. Copy of the American journalist Janet Flanner (1892-1978), correspondent of the New Yorker in Paris, with an autograph note in pencil on the jacket's first flap : "Janet Flanner / gift of / author". Patricia Highsmith met Janet Flanner and her companion Natalia Danesi Murray on her trip to Europe in early 1951. Flanner and Murray were then very supportive financially for the young, penniless writer. "Janet Flanner said to everyone about Pat: "She has talent." Strangers on a train was translated into Italian by Ester Danesi, Natali's mother and published by Bompiani in 1954. A few days before Janet's departure to the United States in May 1951, Patricia Highsmith wrote in her diary : "How like a schmuck I feel in comparison to her - and in accordance with my perverse nature, I am immediately better (more open in every way) as soon as she is gone, while all I should have liked to do was please her". Near fine in an unclipped dust jacket, in excellent condition despite tiny tears to spine top end and minor spotting to the blue cloth. In her first novel, Highsmith revels in eliciting the unsettling psychological forces that lurk beneath the surface of everyday life. Two men meet quite casually on the Washington-to-New York train, Guy Haines, a tennis star, and Bruno Anthony, who makes an offer to exchange murders. Bruno Anthony, will kill Guy Haines' estranged wife if Guy will kill Bruno's hated father. Guy doesn't take Bruno seriously until his wife, Miriam, is found murdered in an amusement park. Guy becomes the chief suspect, which threatens his tennis career; his romantic involvement with a U.S. senator's daughter, Anne Morton; his hopes for a political career; and even his life. When Bruno realizes that Guy isn't going to kill his father, he tells Guy that he intends to establish Guy's guilt by planting his monogrammed cigarette lighter at the scene of Miriam's murder. With Anne's help, Guy attempts to stop Bruno after rushing through an important tennis match and racing to the amusement park. Filmed in 1951 and directed by Alfred Hitchcock, the movie starred Farley Granger as Guy Haines, Robert Walker as Bruno Anthony, Ruth Roman as Anne Morton, Kasey Rogers as Miriam Haines, and many others. An exceptional copy of a difficult title.
Seller: Librairie Faustroll, Paris, France
HIGHSMITH, PATRICIA.. STRANGERS ON A TRAIN.. The Cresset Press, 1950., London, 1950.
Price: US$3000.00 + shipping
Description: First U. K. edition of her first and best known novel brilliantly filmed by Alfred Hitchcock, from a screenplay written in large part by Raymond Chandler. Publisher's File Copy with slip affixed to front fly leaf. Near fine in dust jacket with some light professional restoration to the spine ends and corners. In her first novel, Highsmith revels in eliciting the unsettling psychological forces that lurk beneath the surface of everyday life. Two men meet quite casually on the Washington-to-New York train, Guy Haines, a tennis star, and Bruno Anthony, who makes an offer to exchange murders. Bruno Anthony, will kill Guy Haines' estranged wife if Guy will kill Bruno's hated father. Guy doesn't take Bruno seriously until his wife, Miriam, is found murdered in an amusement park. Guy becomes the chief suspect, which threatens his tennis career; his romantic involvement with a U.S. senator's daughter, Anne Morton; his hopes for a political career; and even his life. When Bruno realizes that Guy isn't going to kill his father, he tells Guy that he intends to establish Guy's guilt by planting his monogrammed cigarette lighter at the scene of Miriam's murder. With Anne's help, Guy attempts to stop Bruno after rushing through an important tennis match and racing to the amusement park. Filmed in 1951 and directed by Alfred Hitchcock, the movie starred Farley Granger as Guy Haines, Robert Walker as Bruno Anthony, Ruth Roman as Anne Morton, Kasey Rogers as Miriam Haines, and many others. An exceptional copy of a difficult title.
Seller: BUCKINGHAM BOOKS, ABAA, ILAB, IOBA, GREENCASTLE, PA, U.S.A.
HIGHSMITH, Patricia. Strangers on a Train. The Cresset Press, London, 1950.
Price: US$3500.00 + shipping
Condition: Fine
Description: Uncorrected proof of the first English edition. Fine in unprinted wrappers with applied label of Paul Popper & Co. Literary Services. a touch cocked else fine. Author's ingenious first novel in which two potential murderers exchange victims in order to provide alibis for each other, it established the author as a master of psychological suspense and was the basis for the memorable film adaptation by Alfred Hitchcock. She followed it with her equally successful *The Talented Mr. Ripley*. The only copy of the proof we've seen.
Seller: Between the Covers-Rare Books, Inc. ABAA, Gloucester City, NJ, U.S.A.
HIGHSMITH, Patricia. Strangers on a Train. The Cresset Press, London, 1950.
Price: US$7500.00 + shipping
Condition: Near Fine
Description: First English edition. Near fine with light wear at the edges and foxing on the endpapers and page edges in very good or better dust jacket with wear at the spine ends, some toning on the rear panel and some creasing and a scrape at the top of the front panel. Inscribed by the author: "For Albert Newgarden, I'm touched to see the old Cresset edition, which represents the open-armed reception that Europe gave me. Patricia Highsmith 7 June 1991." Author's ingenious first novel in which two potential murderers exchange victims in order to provide alibis for each other. It established the author as a master of psychological suspense and was the basis for the memorable film adaptation by Alfred Hitchcock. She followed it with her equally successful *The Talented Mr. Ripley*.
Seller: Between the Covers-Rare Books, Inc. ABAA, Gloucester City, NJ, U.S.A.