# Is "Candy" by Terry Southern and Mason Hoffenberg (as 'Maxwell Kenton') a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Candy by Terry Southern and Mason Hoffenberg (as 'Maxwell Kenton') (The Olympia Press, 1958) is identified by: TRUE FIRST is Paris, not New York: The Olympia Press, Traveller's Companion Series No. Precedence: Paris Olympia Press 1958 (as Maxwell Kenton) is the true first.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- TRUE FIRST is Paris, not New York: The Olympia Press, Traveller's Companion Series No
- 64, published October 1958 under the pseudonym 'Maxwell Kenton,' in the series' original green printed wrappers
- First issue has the original printed franc price at the rear wrapper NOT overstamped; copies bearing a later price overstamp are the later state
- Most of the roughly 5,000-copy run was seized and destroyed by French authorities, prompting Girodias to reissue the same text retitled 'Lollipop' (still as Maxwell Kenton, TC No
- 64) with tell-tale alterations to the opening leaves — the dedication changed to 'Master Boon and Master Badj' and the epigraph re-attributed to Rimbaud rather than Voltaire; 'Lollipop' is the ban-evasion reissue, NOT the true first
- Publisher imprint reads The Olympia Press
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Terry Southern and Mason Hoffenberg (as 'Maxwell Kenton') |
| Publisher | The Olympia Press |
| Year | 1958 |
| True first | American edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | TRUE FIRST is Paris, not New York: The Olympia Press, Traveller's Companion Series No |
| Book-club edition exists? | Yes |

## Points of issue
TRUE FIRST is Paris, not New York: The Olympia Press, Traveller's Companion Series No. 64, published October 1958 under the pseudonym 'Maxwell Kenton,' in the series' original green printed wrappers. First issue has the original printed franc price at the rear wrapper NOT overstamped; copies bearing a later price overstamp are the later state. Most of the roughly 5,000-copy run was seized and destroyed by French authorities, prompting Girodias to reissue the same text retitled 'Lollipop' (still as Maxwell Kenton, TC No. 64) with tell-tale alterations to the opening leaves — the dedication changed to 'Master Boon and Master Badj' and the epigraph re-attributed to Rimbaud rather than Voltaire; 'Lollipop' is the ban-evasion reissue, NOT the true first.

## Is this the true first?
Precedence: Paris Olympia Press 1958 (as Maxwell Kenton) is the true first. The first American edition is G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1964, under the authors' real names — a 'first thus,' bound in three-quarter purple cloth over black paper boards with red endpapers and red top-stain, no printing statement on the copyright page; first-state jacket points are the James Jones blurb (not Nelson Algren) on the rear panel and the code '0464' at the foot of the front flap. Both the Paris true first and the Putnam first American are collected; do not let the Putnam 'first American edition' slug pass as the true first.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
The retitled 'Lollipop' (Olympia) is a suppression-driven reissue, not a book club. Numerous later Olympia/derivative and paperback issues are reprints; for the US line, the Putnam 1964 first-state jacket points above separate the true American first from later printings.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Candy* by Terry Southern and Mason Hoffenberg (as 'Maxwell Kenton') a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/candy
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.