MAURICE

New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1971. Fine in fine jacket.. First US edition of Forster's posthumously published class-crossing love story, originally written in 1913 as the "direct result" of Forster's visit to socialist and early gay activist Edward Carpenter and his partner George Merrill. Forster's terminal note, written in 1960, explains both the genesis of the novel and the absolute necessity of its happy conclusion: "I was determined that in fiction anyway two men should fall in love and remain in it for the ever and ever that fiction allows." Early gay novels whose lovers escape the triple doom of death, betrayal, or prison are now commonly identified as groundbreaking, even revolutionary; in 1971, much critical reaction identified this aspect of MAURICE as only another damning example of Forster's Edwardian sentimentality (Phllip Toynbee declared his inability to detect anything "particularly homosexual about MAURICE" and was not alone in finding its romantic sensibility "embarrassing"). Later generations, less easily embarrassed by true love, have thought better of it. A lovely copy. 8.25'' x 5.5''. Original black cloth with gilt-lettered spine. Yellow topstain, fore-edge machine deckle. In original unclipped ($6.95) black dust jacket designed by Golda Fishbein. 256 pages. Minor edgewear to boards and jacket, light spotting to top edge. Offsetting to endpapers.