Lengthy Letter to George Sterling [Written Aboard The Snark and twice signed "Wolf"]

by London, Jack [George Sterling]

First edition

Price: $7,950.00
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Book description: 1907. First edition. Very Good +. THE PRICE SHOWN HAS BEEN REDUCED $2,000 FROM THE REGULAR PRICE FOR THE MONTH OF JANUARY, 2010. A wonderful 12 PAGE LETTER dated 24 November 1907 written entirely in Jack London's distinctive hand, TWICE SIGNED "WOLF", together with the original envelope (addressed in Charmain London's hand and postmarked San Francisco January 25, 1908). "Wolf" signatures are uncommon and this letter is notable, among other reasons, for having two of them. George Sterling, a Poet and a significant figure in Bohemian circles of the early 20th Century, named by his friends as the "uncrowned King of Bohemia", was an important figure in the artistic circles of the San Francisco and Bay area and the man who first described San Francisco as "the cool, grey city of love!". Sterling was a protégé of Jack London's, and the two of them became great friends. The letter, written entirely in London's hand on the rectos of 12 sheets of paper, addresses Sterling using London's name for him ("Oh, You Greek"), and was written while Jack and Charmain London were in the midst of their (planned) long voyage aboard London's beloved boat, the Snark. At the top right corner of the first page, above where he dated the letter, London gives the writer's address, being the then latitude and longitude of the Snark. Describing his difficulties on the long leg between Hilo and the Marquesas, London wrote: "We've had to fight for every inch of easting". London also gave an account of their angling for dolphins and stated: "I find it hard to sleep after catching one of them. The leaping, blazing beauty of it gets on my brain." (This statement was quoted by Andrew Sinclair in his 1977 biography "Jack".) London ends the letter: "I'm going to write up the voyage of the Snark & entitle it 'Around the World With Three Gasoline Engines & a Wife." London signed the letter "Wolf" and then added a PS which he also signed "Wolf". Each page of the letter has been folded twice so that the pages would fit in the envelope, resulting in some tears at the folds. In a letter to a prior owner of this letter, after expressing his anticipation at seeing a copy, Russ Kingman, London expert and proprietor of the the famous Jack London Bookstore,stated: "Letters written while on the Snark are not very common. Since they planned to be gone seven years they didn't have people send the letters back so most were thrown away. At today's prices you did well to get a Twelve page J.L. letter. They almost always were 1/2 pages. If hand written you did extremely well. I can't remember ever seeing one that bulky." A wonderful and RARE LETTER WRITTEN ENTIRELY IN JACK LONDON'S HAND, WRITTEN ON BOARD THE SNARK AND SENT TO LONDON'S DEAR FRIEND GEORGE STERLING AND OF UNUSUALLY GREAT LENGTH---COMPLETE WITH THE ORIGINAL ENVELOPE ADDRESSED BY CHARMAIN LONDON. An uncommon SURVIVAL OF A LETTER WRITTEN BY LONDON ON HIS BELOVED BOAT THE SNARK. TWICE SIGNED "WOLF".

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