Recent Arrivals from 20 Ants Fine Books, IOBA

Bowling Green, Ohio: Bowling Green University Popular Press. Very Good+. 1971. First Edition. Softcover. Minor sunning at the extremities, short phrase underlined on page 5, neat previous owner's signature at head of title page.; Collected essays about S. S. Van Dine, pseudonym of Willard Huntington Wright, author of many stories of Philo Vance. Vance was a one of the great… Read more about this item

San Francisco: City Lights Books. Near Fine. 1968. First American Edition; Second Printing. Softcover. Light crease to the head corner of the first leaf.; Written in 1959 by famed Spanish painter and sculptor Pablo Picasso, this wide-ranging 'poem in parts' draws on Picasso's memories of his boyhood in Malaga, Spain. Each page in Spanish is followed by the same text… Read more about this item

No Publisher Stated. Very Good. 1943. Broadside. The leaf has been trimmed by hand, inexpertly, and only the tail edge is truly parallel to the printed text. Very faint offsetting from an adjacent object. The leaf is lightly tanned at the very edge of the tail.; This is transcript of a radio address delivered by Carl Sandburg… Read more about this item

France. Fine. 1984. Limited/Numbered Edition. Hardcover. The tiniest crease to the creature's tiny toe on one leaf.; A miniature, artist's book, written and designed by French artist Noël Marsault. In polychrome illustrated, thin pasteboards die cut in the shape of a whimsical, imaginary creature lifting one back leg, presumably to urinate. Marsault's drawings and prints are varied, and a somewhat-similar… Read more about this item

Rockville, MD: Quill & Brush. Very Good in Very Good dust jacket. 1994. Limited/Numbered Signed Edition. Hardcover. This is a compendium of 15 tiny essays, by 15 authors, written on the topic of "obsession." These were read aloud from the stage of the 1993 benefit gala for the PEN/Faulkner Literary Foundation, the money raised going to fund their awards for… Read more about this item

Portland, OR: The Chamberlain Press. Fine. 1985. Limited/Numbered Signed Edition. Hardcover. This very old, European folk tale is here retold with subtle humor by children's book author Kenneth Jones. The tale is of hungry travelers who are denied food by distrustful, selfish townspeople. The travelers produce their iron cooking pot, fill it with water and large stones, build a fire… Read more about this item

Amsterdam, Netherlands: Surrealistisch Kabinet. Very Good. 1968. Softcover. Wear and creasing to all edges of the wraps. Diagonal, light crease to the back. Tiny white spot to front.; This is Ted Joans' (1928-2003) 12-line poem The Truth, which he occasionally titled The Poet in readings. In this book, the composition of the poem's lines differs significantly from Joans' original composition… Read more about this item

Hitchen Herts, England: The Red Gull Press. Near Fine with no dust jacket. 1985. Special Limited Edition. Softcover. Consistent with other examples, the wraps of the specially bound book are shallowly wrinkled front and back where the paper frames and labels have contracted, likely when drying.; These verses are excerpted from the classic "Laila and Majnun" story of mystical, devotional… Read more about this item

Gaylordsville: The Slide Mountain Press. Very Good+ with no dust jacket. 1930. Limited/Numbered Signed Edition. Hardcover. Faintest offsetting to the gutters, more so at the gutters between pastedowns and endpapers. Light crease at the tail corner of the first leaf. Cloth over the spine was split and lifting at some point, later laid down again. Head of spine rubbed, tips… Read more about this item

London: The Golden Cockerel Press. Fine with no dust jacket. 1961. Limited Edition. Hardcover. Ostensibly about cats and their ways, this 1727 work is also a witty satire that mocks people and their ways, various strata of society, and exacting scholarship. The prose and verse are fluid with feline and human characteristics ascribed interchangeably. Contemporary criticism treated 'Les Chats' as… Read more about this item

Providence, RI: Burning Deck. Very Good+. 1979. Limited/Numbered Hors Commerce Edition. Softcover. Tiny wear at corners, scratch and light, short crease to back.; Six of Kenward Elmslie's (1929-1922) innovative, eclectic, challenging poems: Night Thought (for Joe Brainard), Stance, Four Doors, Communications Equipment, Olden Scrapple Sonnet (for Bernadette Mayer), and Nytol. Elmslie was a multi-talented author, librettist, performer, and Editor and… Read more about this item

Calais, VT: Z Press. Fine. 1999. Limited Edition. Softcover. Jagged and surreal, this is a single poem by Barbara Guest, poet prominent of the New York School. She drew inspiration from fine artists, and this is an artistic collaboration with painter Trevor Winkfield, brought about by publisher Kenward Elmslie. Tipped in, facing the poem, is a polychrome reproduction of a… Read more about this item

Goring-on-Thames: Elvendon Press. Near Fine. 1986. Elvendon Press. Hardcover. Head corners of the boards are bumped, probably in the making.; This is Charles Dickens' classic novella, ostensibly a ghost story about Christmas time, but with a parallel meaning. It depicts Victorian English oppression and exploitation of the poor, and the opportunity for oppressors to come to their senses and mend… Read more about this item

Private Printing. Very Good-. 1880s-1890s. Unique Copy. Hardcover. All extremities rubbed. Larger, rubbed area of the spine at the tail. Paper covers rubbed at corners. Overall foxing to the free endpapers. Joints cracked, but holding well. Very occasional, light pencil notations.; This is a Sammelband that assembles twenty-four articles about Victorian portrait painters and photographers, all… Read more about this item

New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers. Very Good+. 1996. Second Revised Edition. Paperback. Noticeable bow to text block.; The book follows five boys as they grow and strive in Roxbury, Massachusetts in the racial and political turmoil of the late 60s and early 70s. In socially and physically decaying environments they developed different styles of coping with adversity. Despite some commonalities, they… Read more about this item

New York: The Spiral Press. Fine. 1962. Brochure. One of the various little booklets printed by The Spiral Press, this copy is a Christmas keepsake with an additional preliminary page, printed thus: "Greetings / Christmas / 1962 / From Robert Frost". This was Frost's short poem about the push and pull of nature, and mystic belief vs. science. "In other… Read more about this item

San Francisco: Cranium Press. Fine. 1976. Limited Edition. Softcover. Keith Abbott's wide-ranging poem that bounces through successive observations about himself and life. Boldly inscribed by Abbott to Kenward Elmslie, on the front endpaper in elaborate calligraphic script using a chisel-point pen. "The Ken- / ward / Elmslie / Copy / (a calligraphic flourish) / Keith" Provenance: From the library and… Read more about this item

West Branch (Iowa): Toothpaste Press. Fine. 1983. Limited/Numbered Signed Edition. Softcover. Faint, small scuffing to the matte finished wraps.; This collaboration between author and artist has five short, non-rhyming poems by Ron Padgett, each with a facing page having an utterly quirky illustration by Trevor Winkfield. Yes, woodpeckers and woodpecker society are occasionally involved. This is… Read more about this item

Bolinas, California: Angel Hair Books. Very Good-. 1970. Limited Edition. Softcover. Wraps toned and soiled, as so many are with this edition. Some toned offsetting from an adjacent book. A bit of wave to the head edge of the front.; Thirty-five minimalist, idiosyncratic, freely-constructed poems of experimental technique. Most are terse, some are brief prose poetry, all are non-rhyming, and… Read more about this item

West Branch, Iowa: Toothpaste Press. Fine. 1979. Limited Edition. Softcover. Seven, tiny poems, each creating a scenario for a mystery. Example: "You return to / your bedroom / visibly shaken / as you turn down / the covers a cobra / leaps for your throat / paralyzed you collapse // you are no longer suspect". Each is… Read more about this item