True first - Anil's Ghost

on 29 Oct 2003 in rec.collecting.books, James Calhoun chanted thus:

 > I don't know if the Canadian edition is the "true first" (to my mind
 > that would seem to mean the first edition that hit the press, but I may
 > be wrong) but the Canadian first is published by M&S --McCelland (sp?)
 > and Stewart.
 >
 > Cheers,
 >
 > james
 >
 >
 > "John Warner" <jwarner6 RemoveThis @comcast.net> wrote in message
 > news:bea44668.0310281312.5cfd5767@posting.google.com...
  >> I picked up a first British edition of Anil's Ghost by Michael
  >> Ondaatje. Is this the true first? I have heard that generally the
  >> true first is the country of residence of the author. Since Mr.
  >> Ondaatje lives in Toronto, you got me since I don't know if Canada
  >> even published his book.
 >

The rule about 'following the country' applies only if and when a book is
published simultaneously in more than one country. But it is a somewhat
arbitrary rule, and open to interpretation if the author, say, is a citizen
of one country resident in another at the time of publishing.

Frank Harris's 'Bernard Shaw' was published in 1931, simultaneously by two
imprints in the US (Book League of America and Simon & Schuster) and one in
the UK (Gollancz). Harris was born in Ireland, a UK citizen by parentage,
but had become a US citizen in the 20s. However when the Shaw book was
published he was dead: just prior to his death he had been living in Nice,
France. The Simon & Schuster is generally taken as 'The True First' as the
other US is a Book Club edition.

--
Alfred Armstrong
Unusual books unmasked at <a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.oddbooks.com/" target="_blank">http://www.oddbooks.com/</a>
"The eye has been described by scientists as a small-sized volcano"
- Webster Edgerly<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: True first - Anil's Ghost 

John Warner wrote:

 > I picked up a first British edition of Anil's Ghost by Michael
 > Ondaatje. Is this the true first? I have heard that generally the
 > true first is the country of residence of the author. Since Mr.
 > Ondaatje lives in Toronto, you got me since I don't know if Canada
 > even published his book.

If you go to <a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://dogbert.abebooks.com/abe/BookSearch" target="_blank">http://dogbert.abebooks.com/abe/BookSearch</a> you will find
several hundred copies being offered for sale. I clicked on the "first
edition" and "highest price" options and as I checked through the first page
of results I noticed copies published by Knopf generally had the statement
"first US edition", those published by Bloomsbury generally had "first UK
edition", and most of those those published by McClelland and Stewart (i.e.,
in Canada) simply said "first edition". Three sellers (Joseph The Provider /
Books, ABAA, The Book Collector/Decades and Ed Smith Books) identified the
Canadian edition as the "true first". No sellers made the same claim of the
UK or US editions.

Of course, one sometimes sees the blind leading the blind on ABE (one
bookseller makes an erroneous claim which is then taken up like a refrain by
others), but one would expect Joseph the Provider, as an ABAA member, to
have done their homework, Ed Smith Books gains extra credibility by giving
details of the print run on the Canadian edition. If I was terribly bothered
about it I'd check other sources, but for most purposes I'd assume the ABE
sellers had got it right

--
John
<a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://rarebooksinjapan.com" target="_blank">http://rarebooksinjapan.com</a><!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
 >> Stay informed about: True first - Anil's Ghost 

Thank you John. I use abebooks all the time. I should have thought
about this as a resource.
 >> Stay informed about: True first - Anil's Ghost