Muriel Spark First Editions

• The Comforters — 1957 · MacmillanLondon: Macmillan, 1957 (published February 1957). Spark's first novel. Cloth binding; first-issue dust jacket bearing Evelyn Waugh's advance praise and priced to the flap, unclipped. Copyright page states 'First published 1957' with no later impression line. The UK Macmillan edition (1957) is the true first, preceding the US Lippincott edition of the same year. Later impressions add a printing or impression statement to the copyright page.
• Memento Mori — 1959 · MacmillanLondon: Macmillan & Co., 1959; octavo, 246 pages. Publisher's cloth with gilt spine lettering. The copyright page states 'First published 1959' with no later-impression line. The first-issue pictorial dust jacket, in mauve and ochre tones, should retain its printed price to the flap and be unclipped in the correct state. The UK Macmillan edition (1959) is the true first, preceding the US Lippincott edition of the same year. Later impressions add an impression statement to the copyright page.
• The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie — 1961 · MacmillanLondon: Macmillan, 1961. Publisher's green cloth with gilt spine titles; dust jacket illustrated by Victor Reinganum, with its printed price (the printed price), unclipped. Copyright page states 'First published 1961'. The UK Macmillan edition (1961) is the true first, preceding the US Lippincott edition (1962). The novel also appeared, slightly abridged, as essentially the entire 14 October 1961 issue of The New Yorker, but that magazine appearance is not a book edition. Later Macmillan impressions add a printing statement; the US edition is a separate setting. No significant book-club issue precedes the UK first.
• The Girls of Slender Means — 1963 · MacmillanLondon: Macmillan & Co., 1963. First edition, first impression bound in blue boards stamped in gilt on the spine, octavo format. The copyright page states 'First published 1963' with no later-impression statement, and the first-issue dust jacket retains the printed price to the flap, unclipped. The UK Macmillan edition (1963) is the true first. The near-simultaneous US Alfred A. Knopf edition (New York, 1963) is a separate first American edition, issued in a dust jacket designed by George Salter. Later Macmillan impressions add an impression statement to the copyright page. Distinguish the UK Macmillan true first from the US Knopf first by imprint and by the Salter-designed jacket on the Knopf issue.
• The Driver's Seat — 1970 · MacmillanFirst edition in book form published by Macmillan, London, in September 1970, in the publisher's green cloth lettered in silver to the spine, issued in the pictorial dust jacket (priced at the front flap). The complete text had appeared in The New Yorker on 16 May 1970 ahead of book publication — a prior periodical appearance, not a book edition. Copyright page carries the Macmillan 1970 imprint with no…. Macmillan (London) 1970 is the accepted true first edition in book form and precedes the Alfred A. Knopf (New York) 1970 first American edition; both are collected, with London holding priority. The New Yorker printing (16 May 1970) is the first appearance in print but is a magazine serialization, not the first book — treat it as a 'first appearance,' not the collectible first edition. No UK book-club issue is noted for the first; later New Directions and Penguin paperbacks are reprints. Confirm the Macmillan imprint and the priced first-issue flap; a clipped flap or a Knopf imprint indicates a different edition.

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