Available Copies from Independent Booksellers
Price: US$154.97 + shipping
Condition: Very Good
Description: First Edition. Hardback. 8vo. pp 75. Illustrations by John Farleigh. Atrractive copy with very faint almost invisible restoration at spine ends. Prelims very slightly foxed. Signed on half title page 'John Farleigh 15th Dec 1932,' Very good indeed.
Seller: Burwood Books, Wickham Market, United Kingdom
Price: US$2500.00 + shipping
Description: Pictorial boards and twenty woodblock illustrations within by John Farleigh. Laurence A210a. This copy INSCRIBED and SIGNED to "Catherine Inge/from/Bernard Shaw" and dated "30/11/32" on the half-title page. Pasted to the facing blank page is an AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED "G. B. S." from Shaw to "My dear Mrs. Inge" discussing a concert as well as the publication of this book. In full: "It was extraordinarily recreative to hear those boys' voices after the screams of the female bourgeoisie of the west country at the Three Choirs Festival. And imagine its being the first time I ever heard a note of music at St. Pauls! THE BLACK GIRL is now equipped with a preface (at the end, as Sir Walter Scott recommended) and a lot of fascinating pictures. The one on page 56 is a speaking likeness of myself in my radiant youth. Keep it on the top shelf out of the Dean's reach. The book will not be published until the 5th." Tipped to the half-title page with a small piece of tape is a short note by the recipient stating that she had lent the book in 1946 for the [National Book League] exhibition for Shaw's 90th birthday. [Mary] Catherine Inge was the wife of William Ralph Inge, the dean of St. Paul's. Foxing to endpapers and to two pages of text. Very Good, lacking the scarce dustwrapper
Seller: Charles Agvent, est. 1987, ABAA, ILAB, Fleetwood, PA, U.S.A.
Price: US$4000.00 + shipping
Description: First edition of George Bernard Shaw's short story collection, including the satirical allegorical title story: The Adventures of The Black Girl in Her Search For God. Octavo, original illustrated boards, pictorial endpapers, designed and illustrated with engravings by John Farleigh. Association copy, inscribed by the author on the half-title page, "To Eleanor and Theodore Roosevelt this Visiting Card after a memorable day at Government House, Manila from Charlotte F. Shaw and G. Bernard Shaw 9th February 1933." Mr. and Mrs. George Bernard Shaw stopped at Manila on a round-the-world cruise where they were invited to lunch with Theodore Roosevelt Jr., the eldest son of Theodore Roosevelt, and his wife Eleanor Butler Alexander-Roosevelt where they enjoyed lunch and Shaw assisted in editing one of Theodore's reports to the war department. Laid is is a small copy of a selection of pages from Eleanor Butler Alexander-Roosevelt's 1959 autobiography 'Day Before Yesterday' which describes the visit in detail and also mentions the occasion upon which they received the current inscribed volume in the mail after the Shaw's visit. In near fine condition. In the original glassine which is in very good condition. Rare and desirable with exceptional provenance. The Black Girl, as protagonist in the present volume, serves the same purpose as Christian in John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress; that is to say her own "inner", or "spiritual" life is represented as a series of physical events and encounters. After becoming dissatisfied with the inconsistencies of the answers the missionary who has converted her gives to her questions, the Black Girl wanders into the forest on a literal search for God. Having a powerful intellect capable of formulating searching theological questions, and exposing vapid answers, the Black Girl so becomes superior to the inferior insipid white missionary woman, challenging popular prejudice, both in sex and race.
Seller: Raptis Rare Books, Palm Beach, FL, U.S.A.