The Prodigal Parents by Lewis, Sinclair [Harry] (1885-1951) - 1938

[[i-viii]+[1]+301+[302-04] pages. Octavo (8" x 5 1/2") bound in original publisher's red cloth with gilt title and author's name on spine and embossed "SL" on cover in original jacket. (Pastore: 251) First state, limited to 10,000 copies with title page 1/4 inch shorter at bottom than surrounding leaves, corrected in later print run. signed First edition.

Lewis had commented to several parties privately that Doubleday, Doran was putting too much focus on the Nobel Prize and too little on him. Word reached the publisher and the result was the addition of Lewis's initials to the olive branch motif on the cover of this and subsequent novels. The novel in an attack on the Communist left as a response the way It can't Happen Here was an attack on the totalitarian right; it deals with the "generation gap" and was soundly criticized by Lewis's former socialistic associates, Upton Sinclair, in particular, who vied the book as an apologia for middle-class values and mores, those same values and mores which Lewis had so well attacked. The book was written quickly and obsessively during the stage run of It Can't Happen Here and it sold fairly well. The jacket design, an overly serious, almost funereal combination of black, gilt and the intertwined laurel branch and initials hardly befits the light tone of the contents and is a good example of the detachment of the publisher from the published. The book is easy to come by in collectible condition, although the spine gilt on the jacket rubs easily as does the back ground of the jacket overall.

Condition:

Book plate on front pasted down, the work "signed" on the front end paper with Lewis's signature; jacket with closed edge tears, spine ends rubbed with some small chips and tears, hinges rubbed else a very good copy in like jacket.