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AMIS, Kingsley.

Lucky Jim

A Novel.

First edition, first impression. Amis’s epochal first novel. With the author’s signed presentation inscription to the front free endpaper, “Sincerest good wishes to James and Elsa from Kingsley ‘these first fruits’ January 1954”. The recipients were James (“Jo”) and Elsa Bartley, a couple with whom Amis was close friends during his time in Swansea. It was they who introduced Amis to the hard-partying Welsh bourgeoisie depicted in Amis’s second novel, That Uncertain Feeling. Presentation copies of Lucky Jim in first edition are very scarce. Only the dedication copy inscribed to Philip Larkin has appeared at auction in 35 years. This is the only other example we have handled.

Octavo. Original green boards, titles to spine in gold. With the dust jacket probably supplied from another copy. Housed in a quarter green morocco solander box made by The Chelsea Bindery. Some foxing to fore edge and terminal leaves, contents sporadically marked, spine a little dull. Very good in a rather marked dust jacket with a couple of tears to the rear panel and some minor loss at the tips.