# Is "Book of the Hopi" by Frank Waters a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Book of the Hopi by Frank Waters (The Viking Press, 1963) is identified by: The Viking Press, New York, 1963 (published December 1963; LCCN 63-19606). US only.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- The Viking Press, New York, 1963 (published December 1963
- LCCN 63-19606)
- The copyright page carries Viking's first-publication statement dated 1963 — 'First published in 1963' — with no later-printing notice
- Viking's house practice from the late 1930s onward was to state the year of first publication and to add a notice for every subsequent printing, so any stated 'Second printing' (those copies are dated 1964) rules a copy out
- Octavo, 347 pp., with drawings and source material recorded by Oswald White Bear Fredericks, photographic plates (about twelve leaves), a Hopi alphabet and a glossary
- The binding is two-tone quarter cloth — a pale tan/yellow cloth spine over darker brown/orange cloth boards, the spine lettered and decorated and the front board blind-stamped; dealers describe the colours inconsistently, partly through fading, so read the two-tone structure rather than the colour names
- Publisher imprint reads The Viking Press

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Frank Waters |
| Publisher | The Viking Press |
| Year | 1963 |
| True first | US edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | The Viking Press, New York, 1963 (published December 1963 |
| Book-club edition exists? | No |

## Points of issue
The Viking Press, New York, 1963 (published December 1963; LCCN 63-19606). The copyright page carries Viking's first-publication statement dated 1963 — 'First published in 1963' — with no later-printing notice; Viking's house practice from the late 1930s onward was to state the year of first publication and to add a notice for every subsequent printing, so any stated 'Second printing' (those copies are dated 1964) rules a copy out. Octavo, 347 pp., with drawings and source material recorded by Oswald White Bear Fredericks, photographic plates (about twelve leaves), a Hopi alphabet and a glossary. The binding is two-tone quarter cloth — a pale tan/yellow cloth spine over darker brown/orange cloth boards, the spine lettered and decorated and the front board blind-stamped; dealers describe the colours inconsistently, partly through fading, so read the two-tone structure rather than the colour names. The jacket is pictorial and priced at the flap, so unclipped copies retain the price; the jacket spine is prone to fading.

## Is this the true first?
US only. The Viking Press, New York, 1963 is the true first — there is no UK first-edition competitor and no original-language question, as the book was written in English. Title trap worth flagging: library cataloguing of the 1963 Viking sheets gives the title as 'Book of the Hopi', without the definite article, while later paperbacks and many dealer listings style it 'The Book of the Hopi'. The Payot (French) and other translations are later.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
No book-club edition is documented for the Viking 1963. The reprint traps are Viking's own later printings, which state themselves (the second printing is dated 1964 and carries a stated printing notice), the Ballantine mass-market paperback (from 1972) and the Penguin paperback (from 1977) — both commonly shelved as 'The Book of the Hopi'. Any copy in a paperback wrapper, or bearing a Penguin or Ballantine imprint, is a reprint whatever the 1963 copyright line says.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Book of the Hopi* by Frank Waters a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/book-of-the-hopi
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.