THE JUNGLE. New York: The Jungle Publishing Co., [1906]. Octavo, pp. [1-10] 1-413 [414: blank] [415-417: ads] [418: blank] [note: first leaf is a blank], original pictorial olive green cloth, front and spine panels stamped in black and white. First edition, first printing. A presentation copy with signed inscription by Sinclair to poet George Sterling on the front free endpaper: "To George Sterling / with the regards of / The Author." Below Sinclair's inscription Jack London has added a gift inscription: "Blessed Greek! / -- Wolf. / March 6, 1906." The projected publication date of the The Jungle Publishing Co. issue was 15 February 1906. The editions of The Jungle Publishing Co. and Doubleday, Page & Company were published simultaneously: Jungle's copies with integral title leaf and the "SUSTAINER'S EDITION" label on the front paste-down are the earliest, but the Doubleday, Page copies with tipped in title leaves precede Jungle's regular copies. Sinclair's best known and most popular novel. This exposé of the Chicago stockyards and packing houses, more a Socialist treatise than a work of fiction, led to the pure food campaign of the Theodore Roosevelt era. "Next to UNCLE TOM'S CABIN, the most famous propaganda novel in American literature." - Adams, Radical Literature in America, p. 59. "The UNCLE TOM'S CABIN of wage slavery!" - Jack London. "If Sinclair has never been a great creative novelist ..., he has been something else of value -- one of the great information centers in American literature. Few American novelists have done more to make their fellow citizens conscious of the society, all of it, in which they live." - Rideout, The Radical Novel in the United States 1900-1954, pp. 30-38. Blake, p. 238. Coan, pp. 86; 214. Hanna 3234. Smith, American Fiction, 1901-1925 S-509. FPAA V, p. 298. This copy never had a "sustainer's" label affixed to front paste-down. After Sterling's death by suicide in 1926, the book passed into the hands of Edna R. Pierson, whose bookplate is affixed to the front paste-down. Below the bookplate is a lightly penciled note in Edna's hand that reads: "Mary Lofler, friend of Geo. Sterling's & also his landlady (& mine) gave me this in 1926." Edna has also identified "Blessed Greek" as "London's nick name for Sterling" and "Wolf" as "Jack London" Cloth worn at edges, delicate white chalk lettering perished from spine panel, early reinforcement of inner hinges with white paper tape, front hinge cracked again, still a sturdy copy. A small leaflet (90 x 153 mm), London's CIRCULATE "THE JUNGLE" (BAL 11892 Open Letter A [B?]) is laid in. A wonderful association copy. (#164561).
Price: $8,500.00
"Published February, 1906" on copyright page.