# Is "Meditations in an Emergency" by Frank O'Hara a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Meditations in an Emergency by Frank O'Hara (Grove Press, 1957) is identified by: Grove Press first edition, 1957. US true first; an early O'Hara collection.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- Grove Press first edition, 1957
- The standard trade issue is in stiff paper wrappers (Evergreen, roughly 900 copies)
- The hardcover is a signed, numbered limited issue in green cloth (75 copies signed by O'Hara), preceded by a special issue of 15 copies that adds a frontispiece drawing by Grace Hartigan
- Contains the title poem and 'To the Harbormaster.'
- Publisher imprint reads Grove Press
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Frank O'Hara |
| Publisher | Grove Press |
| Year | 1957 |
| True first | US edition |
| Format | Poetry |
| Key point | Grove Press first edition, 1957 |
| Book-club edition exists? | No |

## Points of issue
Grove Press first edition, 1957. The standard trade issue is in stiff paper wrappers (Evergreen, roughly 900 copies). The hardcover is a signed, numbered limited issue in green cloth (75 copies signed by O'Hara), preceded by a special issue of 15 copies that adds a frontispiece drawing by Grace Hartigan. Contains the title poem and 'To the Harbormaster.'

## Is this the true first?
US true first; an early O'Hara collection. The cloth is the signed limited issue and is far scarcer than the wrappers trade issue.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
No book-club edition. Correction: the crux is the wrappers trade issue versus the signed/numbered cloth limited issue (with the 15-copy Hartigan-frontispiece special issue above it), not a plain unsigned 'cloth vs paperback' split.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Meditations in an Emergency* by Frank O'Hara a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/meditations-in-an-emergency
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.