Description
AN EXTRAORDINARY PRESENTATION COPY: ROBERT GRAVES’ GOOD-BYE TO ALL THAT, FIRST ISSUE, INSCRIBED BY GRAVES TO PUBLISHER AND REVIEWER ALAN STEELE WITH AN EXTENSIVE KEY TO THE IDENTITIES OF THE CHARACTERS
GRAVES, Robert. Good-bye to All That. London: Jonathan Cape, (1929). Octavo, original salmon cloth, original dust jacket. Housed in a custom chemise and half morocco slipcase.
First edition, first issue, of Graves’ memoir of his life until age 34, an extraordinary presentation copy inscribed by him in the month of publication to publisher and reviewer Alan Steele with a key to the real names of the characters featured in the book: “Robert Graves to Alan Steele, Nov. 1929 N.B. not for publication: Key to characters, Dirty Williams= Dirty Edwards, Buzz Off=Clegg Hill, Surreyman=Drake Brockman, Actor=Wynne Edwards, Delilah Becker=Angel Heavens, Philips=Philpot, Jamaica=Peter Kin, Private Robinson=Private Probyn, Scatter=Minshill-Ford.”
While Graves is known “mainly as a writer of historical novels… His wider fame was first established… by the autobiography Good-bye to All That in 1929. This admirable book… stands in a perceptible relationship to the Claudius novels. The ‘I’ in each case is very much the product of the surrounding civilization, even while evaluating and indeed rejecting it” (DNB). Cyril Connolly included the book in his list of 100 key books of the Modern Movement, noting the peculiar genius of an author to transform autobiography into art (Connolly, The Modern Movement 61). In it, Graves recounts his life and experiences during World War I with the Royal Welch Fusiliers, and his friendship with such literary figures as T.E. Lawrence, Siegfried Sassoon, and Wilfred Owen. Many of the names were pseudonyms, however, as attested by the inscription in this copy: it was not until the Graves’ revised edition of 1957—almost 30 years later—that he restored the original names of the people mentioned in the work. First issue, with Sassoon poem, which was excised and replaced with cancels in many copies, and edited out in later issues. The poem was originally written as part of a letter to Graves, and was included in this book without Sassoon’s permission. Upon publication, Sassoon was horrified and demanded it be excised. It was, but their friendship was destroyed. At the time of this inscription, the recipient of this copy, Alan Steele, worked at the publishing firm William Jackson promoting the sales of young writers. He later founded the firm of Joiner & Steele, and eventually became head of the printing house of Butler and Tanner.
Book fine, with a bit of foxing to text block fore-edge only. Dust jacket with repair to back panel verso. Inscribed copies of this book, especially in the first issue, are of the utmost rarity. We know of no other contemporary presentation copies and in lieu of the Sassoon copy—which is thought to have been destroyed—it is hard to imagine any copy better than this, with its extraordinary key to the characters.
