Rare Book Monthly
Book Catalogue Reviews - December - 2007 Issue
Literature and Book Arts from the William Reese Co.
Some of Andre Racz' claws.
Item 127 is a 14 x 22 window card for the film adaptation of the Truman Capote novel In Cold Blood. The irony here is dramatic, for the role of the killer in this 1968 movie was played by Robert Blake. A few decades later, Blake himself was charged with murder, for the killing of his wife. He was acquitted, unlike the character he portrayed in the film, though he was ordered to pay her family millions of dollars in a later civil suit. $125.
All this talk of killing takes us seamlessly, though unseemly, to item 482, Alice Notley's When I Was Alive. This is a 1980 work of the modern poet, and for those who might be concerned, despite the implication, Ms. Notley is still quite alive. $55.
Item 639 is a first edition of one of the greatest classics related to nature and the environment, Henry David Thoreau's Walden; or, Life in the Woods. This is a first printing from 1854. $22,000.
Item 522 is Reign of Claws by artist Andre Racz. The Rumanian-born Racz was a painter and sculptor who came to the United States in 1939 and was a professor and professor emeritus for many years at Columbia University until his death in 1994. This early work of his, dated 1945, consists of eight signed engravings true to its title - it depicts various crustaceans and shells. $2,250.
The William Reese Company can be found online at www.reeseco.com, telephone 203-789-8081.
