USELESS HANDS ... Authorized Translation from the French by Elisabeth Abbott. New York: E. P. Dutton & Company, [1926]. Octavo, pp. [i-vi] vii-viii [1-2] 3-300 [301-312: blank] [note: last six leaves are blanks], original decorated black cloth, front and spine panels stamped in light blue, top edge stained blue, fore-edge untrimmed, bottom edge rough trimmed, light green endpapers. First edition in English. Translation of LES CONDAMNES A MORT (1920). A fine novel of an automated nightmare world of the future. "Told on an almost surrealistic level; cerebral, but imaginative; far superior to the similar METROPOLIS by Thea von Harbou." - Bleiler, Science-Fiction: The Early Years 701. Anatomy of Wonder (1981) 2-26; (1987) 2-30; (1995) 2-35; and (2004) II-395. Clareson, Science Fiction in America, 1870s-1930s 291. Locke, A Spectrum of Fantasy, p. 81. Bleiler (1978), p. 71. Reginald 05228. Neat early owner's inked signature on front free endpaper, several faint, minor insect tracks on front panel, two very short tears at upper edge of one of the rear blank leaves, else a fine copy in a good to very good pictorial dust jacket with an irregular chip from the base of the spine panel measuring up 10 mm on the left to 26 mm on the right (with loss of half of publisher's imprint) and several smaller chips and tears, mainly along upper and lower edges at head of spine panel and corner tips. Old tape reinforcements have been removed and replaced with inconspicuous archival tape. All in all, a fairly nice example of this scarce (and striking) jacket. (#75231).
Price: $300.00
No statement of printing.