Available Copies from Independent Booksellers
Price: US$900.00 + shipping
Description: From the library of Julian Beck and Judith Malina, founders of The Living Theatre in New York and Paris, and lifelong partners in an open marriage. An except from Malina's diary, March 14, 1953 about James Agee: "An extraordinary stranger - dark-maned, ponderous - enters the Remo, I point him out and ask around "Who's that?" He has a snarling look, as though long ago abandoned by fate - to remorse-laden anger and anguished compassion. Someone says, 'James agee." And the animal cry of 'A Mother's Tale,' and the transcendent poetry of "Let Us Now Praise Famous Men" - is what I remark in this handsome face. I begged Julian to introduce me, for he had once met him, but that was years ago, and he was shy to approach him. Agee had several drinks. Julian was still talking to Frank O'Hara / stray child of the Muses / when Agee left. feeling thwarted and seething, I went off to Wshington Square, to thoughts of past, present and future. Of the future: I want Jim Agee to be my lover." And he was. (added when published). The book was signed upon acquisition by Julian Beck on 6/25/45. On some later date, presumably after the affair, it was additionally signed on a different page by Judith Malina who drew a heart next to her signature. BOOK IS VERY GOOD++ --- A SOLID COPY WITH MINOR WEAR AT SPINE ENDS, TIGHT BINDING, STRAIGHT CORNERS. PHOTOS FRIMLY BOUND IN AND CLEAN, AS IS TEXT. THERE IS A POOR DUST JACKET WITH IT - $5.00 PRICE, CHIPS AT TOP, BOTTOM AND FLAP FOLDS, SOILING TO REAR PANEL, REAR FLAP SEPARATED.
Seller: MARK POST, BOOKSELLER, San Francisco, CA, U.S.A.
Price: US$5600.00 + shipping
Description: 8vo., [2], xvi, 471 pp. and 31 full-page b&w plates from photographs. Publisher's black cloth, spine titled in silver, lightly rubbed at the spine ends; small neat bookseller's ticket on the rear free endpaper. The dust jacket has had minor restoration at the folds, bottom edge of the front panel, and spine ends; it is possibly married to this copy. This is a near fine book in a very good or better dust jacket that was professionally restored; housed in a clamshell box of brown morroco and cloth, titled in gilt on the spine. This copy is inscribed and presented by James Agee to his friend, photographer Florence Meyer Homolka on the front free endpaper, " Flo, with love - Jim, December 11, 1948." Florence Meyer Homolka was born in New York City, January 22, 1911, the eldest daughter of Eugene Meyer, financier and publisher of the Washington Post, and Elizabeth (Ernst) Meyer. She studied dance and acting in Paris and Berlin, associating with artists; she once played her violin in the studio of Constantin Brancusi. In Berlin, she met and married the noted actor, Oskar Homolka. The couple left Berlin in 1939, spent a few years in London, were part of the New York acting and literary circle, and in 1943, settled in Pacific Palisades. During her Paris years she met Man Ray, and living close to him in the Los Angeles area, became his student of photography. " Man Ray is my revered teacher, and I am proud when he tells me that I am following in his footsteps as a photographer." With her connection to Hollywood, she worked as a photographer on several film sets, and after her divorce in 1946, she return to New York. She regularly sold her portraits for publication; among her sitters were: Judy Garland, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, Thomas Mann, Vladimir Horowitz, Arnold Schoenberg, Christopher Isherwood, Edward Steichen, Brassai, Man Ray, and for Charlie Chaplin - she made over 150 photographs on the set of Limelight. Among her friends were Walker Evans and James Agee; she made portraits of both. For Agee's posthumously published, Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, A Death in the Family, one of Homolka's portraits was used on the dust jacket. Florence Homolka died in Los Angeles, November 27, 1962. Of this first edition, only 2416 copies were printed. Copies signed or inscribed by James Agee (1909 - 1955) are rare, let alone such an association copy. Only one inscribed copy has appeared for auction from 1982 - 2022; it is described as follows: Let Us Now Praise Famous Men. Boston, 1941. Illustrated by Walker Evans. 8vo., original cloth, in worn dust jacket, binding with bump & minor soiling. Inscribed for John, and signed Jim Agee. Sotheby's New York, November 16, 2004, lot 268, $4000. (price before buyer's premium added).
Seller: Andrew Cahan: Bookseller, Ltd., ABAA, Akron, OH, U.S.A.
Price: US$6000.00 + shipping
Description: Original black cloth, blocked in silver. Rear endpaper stained from a newsprint enclosure, else a near-fine copy in dust jacket, slightly faded on the spine and with a few small closed tears. Inscribed by Evans in pencil on the front free endpaper to the photographer and collector "Arnold Crane / from Walker Evans / memorably."
Seller: Thomas A. Goldwasser Rare Books (ABAA), CHESTER, CT, U.S.A.