My Friend Henry Miller (SIGNED & INSCRIBED, with postcards)
London: Neville Spearman, 1955. First UK edition. SIGNED by Miller and Perles on slip tipped to ffep and further INSCRIBED by Miller "For Rollo Peters" (socially prominent Monterey actor/designer and son of artist Charle Rollo Peters). Octavo. (xii), 242pp. Frontispiece and 10 plates. Original blue cloth, gilt titles to spine in photo-illustrated dust jacket. Mild wear to extremities, chip to spine ends and lower front cover, else a Very Good copy in a Very Good dust jacket. Preface by Henry Miller. A biography by one of Henry Miller's long-time friends about Miller's life, work and art in Paris and back home in America; includes writers Anais Nin, Lawrence Durrell and positive critiques of the 'Tropics' by T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, Cyril Connolly, Aldous Huxley and George Orwell. (Shifreen & Jackson B85a). Item #23142
A fascinating association copy with meaningful ephemera laid in, including two manuscript postcards from Miller to Webster (Toby) Street laid in. Toby Street was a Monterey attorney and friend of Henry Miller (as well as John Steinbeck, accompanying Steinbeck on the 1940 Sea of Cortez expedition aboard the Western Flyer).
In an April 9, 1966 postcard (HM at age 3 1/2) postmarkd 'Pacific Palisades' he writes "Easter Dear Toby - Are you getting anywhere with the welfare people regarding Lauretta? Happy Easter! Henry". (Lauretta was Miller's younger, developmentally disabled, sister. He was protective of her and later wrote about these childhood experiences in his autobiographical works; after his mother's death, he brought Lauretta back to California and placed her in a care facility there.) In a second postcard ('HM 'Banjo Self-Portrait') dated April 21, 1966 postmarked 'Beverly Hills' he writes "4/21/66 Dear Toby - Re yours of the 19th, if Eve (no doubt his fourth wife Eve McClure) is willing to do this little job, the arrangement suits me. Will take it for granted unless I hear otherwise. Henry"
Completing the collection is an invitation to the September 13, 1981 dedication to the Henry Miller Memorial Library in Big Sur. The notecard reproduces 'Tiger, Tiger,' a painting by Emil White, Miller's longtime friend, caretaker, personal secretary, and neighbor. After Miller's death White transformed his own rustic redwood cabin (in a meadow surrounded by trees) into a memorial and shrine dedicated to Miller).
Together, the book, inscribed for an important Montereyan, two postcards to Toby Street with personal content, and the invitation to the opening of Miller's Memorial Library(with pine needles laid in!), make a compelling collection representing important threads of Miller's life.
Price: $400.00