Great Contemporaries.
New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1937. First edition, first printing. Hardcover. This is a superior, jacketed first U.S. edition, first printing, of Churchill's much praised collection of insightful essays about 21 leading personalities of the day - including the likes of Lawrence, Shaw, and, most famously, Hitler.
While not perfect, this is certainly one of the best copies we have encountered. Condition is near fine in a very good plus dust jacket. The blue cloth binding is square, tight, immaculately clean, and unfaded, with sharp corners. We note only some wrinkling at the spine ends and a faint, irregular vertical crease to the spine cloth which, since it is not straight and does not extend the full length of the spine, we presume is an original binding flaw. The contents are improbably bright and crisp. The book feels unread. The red topstain remains vividly bright. The untrimmed fore edges are likewise improbably clean, showing not even any appreciable age-toning. Only the endpapers show transfer browning – ostensibly from the pastedown glue. The sole previous ownership marks are confined to the front pastedown and contemporary, from the first owner. On the upper front pastedown is an inked “X Mas 1937” gift inscription to “Sallie H. Gayley” and, on the lower front pastedown, the printed bookplate of “SALLIE HARRIS GAYLEY” featuring a quote from American author and poet Caroline Wells (1862-1942): “They borrow books they will not buy, | They have no ethics or religions; | I wish some kind Burbankian guy | Could cross my books with homing pigeons.”
The dust jacket remains strikingly bright, with no color shift between the deep blue of the spine and front cover, is nearly complete, with only fractional hints of loss to the hinge and flap fold extremities, and is unclipped, retaining the original “$4.00” upper front flap price. The jacket shows modest wear to extremities, including some minor wrinkling and short closed tears at the spine ends and lower front face. The upper 1.75 inches of the rear face shows a strip of faint differential toning, as well as light soiling. The dust jacket is protected beneath a clear, removable, archival cover.
Neville Chamberlain, perhaps Churchill’s most vexing political opponent at the time Great Contemporaries was published, wrote to Churchill on 4 October 1937: “How you can go on throwing off these sparkling sketches with such apparent ease & such sustained brilliance… is a constant source of wonder to me.” Naturally, in the course of sketching the character of his contemporaries Churchill necessarily reveals some of his own character and perspective.
Churchill's portrait of T.E. Lawrence, published here just a few years before the Second World War, might well have been written about the author rather than by him: "The impression of the personality of Lawrence remains living and vivid upon the minds of his friends, and the sense of his loss is in no way dimmed among his countrymen. All feel the poorer that he has gone from us. In these days dangers and difficulties gather upon Britain and her Empire, and we are also conscious of a lack of outstanding figures with which to overcome them. Here was a man in whom there existed not only an immense capacity for service, but that touch of genius which everyone recognizes and no one can define." (Great Contemporaries, p.164)
Churchill's piece about Hitler can be a shock to the modern ear, as it underscores his ability to write a balanced appraisal of his subject while expressing his earnest desire to avoid the war that he would fight with such ferocious resolve only a few years later. There is a reason this book has seen many subsequent editions in the intervening years. It was written with what has been called "penetrating evaluation, humor, and understanding."
While some of the subjects of Churchill's sketches have receded into history, many remain well-known and all remain compellingly drawn. This is as engaging a read today as it was in 1937.
Reference: Cohen A105.2.a, Woods/ICS A43(ab.1), Langworth p.179. Item #008946
Price: $1,000.00