A Roving Commission.
New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1930. First edition, first printing. Hardcover. This is the U.S. first edition, first printing of Churchill's extremely popular autobiography, covering the years from his birth in 1874 to his first few years in Parliament. This copy is noteworthy for a trifecta of virtues – a bright binding, interesting provenance, and for being a bibliographic variant.
The book sold very well at the time and, enduringly popular, has seen a great many editions since, many of them collectible in their own right. Of course, a premium attaches to first editions, both British and U.S. Jacketed copies of the U.S. first edition are scarce and respectable unjacketed copies are unusual. The red-orange cloth binding proved highly susceptible to fading, particularly on the spine.
This strikingly bright copy is very good plus. Moreover, it is a bibliographically significant binding variant. Churchill’s bibliographer, Ronald Cohen notes that some second printing copies feature top edges “stained greyish blue.” (Cohen A91.2.b, Vol. I, p.338) The Scribner’s “A” on the copyright page of this copy definitively confirms first printing of the first edition. Nonetheless, it features greyish blue top stain, albeit faded and mottled. The binding is square, clean, and tight and, most impressively, vividly bright with no apparent color shift between the covers and spine. Wear is minor - mild wrinkling to the spine ends, mildly scuffed bottom edges, two small indentations to the blank rear cover, and just a few trivial blemishes to the boards. The contents are clean with no spotting. Differential toning to the endpapers corresponding to dust jacket flaps explains why the binding remains bright; this copy was long jacketed. The sole previous ownership mark is the illustrated bookplate of “Thomas B. Lockwood” (1873-1947). Lockwood was an attorney and businessman as well as philanthropist and bibliophile. He and his wife, Marion Birge Lockwood, donated the funds to construct the University of Buffalo's original Lockwood Memorial Library. When the building was dedicated in 1935, Lockwood presented his remarkable collection of rare materials to the university.
Published in England as My Early Life, this is one of the few Churchill first editions for which the U.S. edition bears a different title than the British. Interestingly, A Roving Commission was the title proposed by Churchill himself and favored by his American publisher.
One can hardly ask for more adventurous content. These momentous and formative years for Churchill included his time as an itinerant war correspondent and cavalry officer in theaters ranging from Cuba, to northwest India, to sub-Saharan and southern Africa. Churchill also recounts his capture and escape during the Boer War, which made him a celebrity and helped launch his political career.
Herein Churchill says: "Twenty to twenty-five! These are the years! Don't be content with things as they are… You will make all kinds of mistakes; but as long as you are generous and true, and also fierce, you cannot hurt the world or even seriously distress her…" (p.60) By the end of his own twenty-fifth year, Churchill had been one of the world’s highest paid war correspondents, published his first five books, made his first lecture tour of North America, braved and breasted both battlefields and the hustings, and been elected to Parliament, where he took his first seat only weeks after the end of Queen Victoria’s reign.
A Roving Commission remains one of the most popular and widely read of Churchill's books. To be sure, Churchill takes some liberties with facts and perhaps unduly lightens or over-simplifies certain events. Nonetheless, the factual experiences of Churchill’s early life compete with any fiction, and any liberties or simplifications are forgivable, in keeping with the wit, pace, and engaging style that characterize the book.
References: Cohen A91.2.a; Woods/ICS A37(b.1); Langworth p. 134; University at Buffalo. Item #008136
Price: $300.00