BALLS FOR A ONE-ARMED JUGGLER by Layton, Irving - 1963

Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1963. 1st edition, full tan decorated cloth, with illustrated dust jacket. Inscribed by Layton to his wife and daughter, signed and dated upon publication. The inscription reads: "For Betty and Naomi, / With love, / Irving / Montreal, Que. / January 28, 1963" in black fountain pen ink on the FEP. Betty Sutherland, an accomplished painter (and later poet), was Layton's second wife and the mother of his first two children. There are corrections to the text of poems on pages 68 and 82 in Layton's hand using the same black ink as the inscription, and three other corrections to poems on pages 21, 87, and 108 in another hand (Sutherland's?) using blue ink. The text includes an Index of Titles and an Index of First Lines. The book is in very good condition, the jacket is quite worn, all forgivable given an unbeatable association copy. Scarce thus.