# Is "Horse Under Water" by Len Deighton a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Horse Under Water by Len Deighton (Jonathan Cape, 1963) is identified by: CENSUS DETAIL CORRECTED — the famous crossword is on the ENDPAPERS, not the dust jacket. Census claim on precedence confirmed, the jacket detail corrected as above.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- CENSUS DETAIL CORRECTED — the famous crossword is on the ENDPAPERS, not the dust jacket
- The first impression has pictorial crossword endpapers, the grid on the left-hand leaf and the clues largely on the right, repeated at both front and back; later impressions substitute plain black endpapers
- The true first was also issued with a loosely inserted blank crossword slip, the clues for which are the ones printed on the endpapers: readers were invited to complete it and post it in for a book-token prize in a competition running from publication day, Monday 21 October, to Thursday 31 October 1963
- Most slips were duly posted in, so surviving copies retaining the insert are very rare and the insert's absence is not itself evidence against a first
- The dust jacket was designed by Raymond Hawkey, with the price present at the flap; the jacket of the proof differs, carrying a photograph of Deighton at HMS Vernon on the front flap
- Publisher imprint reads Jonathan Cape
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Len Deighton |
| Publisher | Jonathan Cape |
| Year | 1963 |
| True first | American edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | CENSUS DETAIL CORRECTED — the famous crossword is on the ENDPAPERS, not the dust jacket |
| Book-club edition exists? | — |

## Points of issue
CENSUS DETAIL CORRECTED — the famous crossword is on the ENDPAPERS, not the dust jacket. The first impression has pictorial crossword endpapers, the grid on the left-hand leaf and the clues largely on the right, repeated at both front and back; later impressions substitute plain black endpapers. The true first was also issued with a loosely inserted blank crossword slip, the clues for which are the ones printed on the endpapers: readers were invited to complete it and post it in for a book-token prize in a competition running from publication day, Monday 21 October, to Thursday 31 October 1963. Most slips were duly posted in, so surviving copies retaining the insert are very rare and the insert's absence is not itself evidence against a first. The dust jacket was designed by Raymond Hawkey, with the price present at the flap; the jacket of the proof differs, carrying a photograph of Deighton at HMS Vernon on the front flap.

## Is this the true first?
Census claim on precedence confirmed, the jacket detail corrected as above. Jonathan Cape (London), published 21 October 1963, is the true first; there was no American edition until G. P. Putnam's Sons (New York) issued it in 1968, stated as the first American edition. One genuine complication must be recorded rather than smoothed over: roughly 500 copies were sent out ahead of publication to reviewers and trade buyers with plain black endpapers, deliberately, so as not to pre-empt the crossword competition, and at least some of those copies physically preceded the first impression. Plain black endpapers therefore cover two quite different things — pre-publication review and trade copies, and ordinary later impressions — and black-endpapered copies carry no "second impression" statement on the copyright page to tell them apart. The state collected as the true first is the crossword-endpaper copy.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
Later Cape impressions have plain black endpapers and are stated on the copyright page. Many sellers omit the endpaper point entirely and a number of copies are offered as true firsts on the strength of the Cape imprint and 1963 date alone; some go further and assert the plain black endpaper copy is the true first. Treat any description that does not address the endpapers as unverified. The Putnam 1968 is the first American, not the first. The later Penguin paperback prints a longer text with material added beyond the Cape first — a text-state trap, and a first thus at most.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Horse Under Water* by Len Deighton a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/horse-under-water
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.