The Comforters by Spark, Muriel - 1957

Philadelphia and New York: J.B. Lippincott Company, 1957 A nice collectible copy of the author' scarce first book. Blue cover boards are clean and crisp. Dust jacket is shelf worn with small tears along extremities, two shallow chips - one at head of spine and the second along top edge of the front panel. $3.50 publisher's price intact on flap. DJ is in mylar sleeve. Text block and interior pages are clean and unmarked. Some light foxing along edge of text block and on end papers but interior pages show no sign of browning or tanning. Binding is tight. 8vo. 224 pp. *** "The Comforters" is the first novel by Scottish author Muriel Spark, it drew on her own experiences as a recent convert to Catholicism and a three-month period when she suffered hallucinations whilst taking the appetite suppressant Dexedrine. Although completed in late 1955 it was not published until 1957, a mutual friend novelist Alan Barnsley having sent the proof's to Evelyn Waugh who was at the time writing "The Ordeal of Gilbert Pinfold" which also dealt with drug-induced hallucinations he had experienced. Waugh's and others positive responses prompted Macmillan to publish the novel in February 1957. The novel was an immediate success and enabled Muriel Spark to give up editorial work and devote herself to full-time creative writing.