The Lying Days

London: Gollancz, 1953. First Edition. Hard Cover. Dust Jacket. Signed by Author. (London: Victor Gollancz Ltd 1953). First UK Edition. SIGNED COPY. Publisher's red boards with gilt lettering to the spine. Boards exceptionally bright and clean. A bookseller's ticket to the rear paste-down and spine tips pushed overall a near fine copy. The VG+ dustwrapper is priced 12/6 net to the inside flap (as called for). The dustwrapper is complete with the usual toning to the spine and has creasing and a touch of fraying to the spine tips. A notoriously fragile post-war dustwrapper this is a nicer copy than normally seen. This is Gordimer’s debut novel and follows on from the publication of two collections of short stories, Face to Face (1949), and The Soft Voice of the Serpent (1952). This copy has an attractive book-plate to the front paste-down of Havelock William Kinsey (1918-2012) who was a founder member of the Military History Society of South Africa and wrote numerous articles for the Military History Journal. Signed by the Author to the front free end-paper. "Nadine Gordimer's first novel...tells the story of Helen Shaw, daughter of white middle-class parents in a small gold-mining town in South Africa. As Helen comes of age, so does her awareness grow of the African life around her. Her involvement, as a bohemian student, with young blacks leads her into complex relationships of emotion and action in a culture of dissension" (GoodReads). The novel is semi-autobiographical. Nadine Gordimer was a South African writer, political activist, and recipient of the 1991 Nobel Prize in Literature. She was recognised as a woman "who through her magnificent epic writing has in the words of Alfred Nobel been of very great benefit to humanity". Photographs/scans available upon request.