# Is "The Witch in the Wood" by T. H. White a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of The Witch in the Wood by T. H. White (G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1939) is identified by: Putnam's Sons, New York, 1939 — first edition, first printing, collating vii, 270 pages, with small line drawings and decorations by White throughout. US-first oddity CONFIRMED — the census claim is correct.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York, 1939 — first edition, first printing, collating vii, 270 pages, with small line drawings and decorations by White throughout
- Bound in glossy blue cloth, the spine lettered in gilt and the front board bearing a gilt stamp, top edge stained red, fore-edge machine-deckled and untrimmed
- Issued in a pictorial dust jacket; look for the price present at the front flap (unclipped) and a copyright page carrying no later-printing statement
- Measurements run about 8 x 5.5 inches
- These Putnam sheets are the only first-edition appearance of the text under this title
- Publisher imprint reads G. P. Putnam's Sons
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | T. H. White |
| Publisher | G. P. Putnam's Sons |
| Year | 1939 |
| True first | US edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York, 1939 — first edition, first printing, collating vii, 270 pages, with small line drawings and decorations by… |
| Book-club edition exists? | Yes |

## Points of issue
G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York, 1939 — first edition, first printing, collating vii, 270 pages, with small line drawings and decorations by White throughout. Bound in glossy blue cloth, the spine lettered in gilt and the front board bearing a gilt stamp, top edge stained red, fore-edge machine-deckled and untrimmed. Issued in a pictorial dust jacket; look for the price present at the front flap (unclipped) and a copyright page carrying no later-printing statement. Measurements run about 8 x 5.5 inches. These Putnam sheets are the only first-edition appearance of the text under this title.

## Is this the true first?
US-first oddity CONFIRMED — the census claim is correct. Putnam's Sons, New York, 1939 precedes the first British edition (Collins, London, 1940, 281 pages) by one full calendar year, reversing the usual pattern for White, whose The Sword in the Stone had gone Collins-first in 1938. Multiple independent ABAA-grade dealers state the precedence explicitly ('This American edition is the true First Edition, published the year before the British edition'; 'first American edition, first printing, preceding the first British edition by one calendar year'). Both are collected: Putnam 1939 is the true first, Collins 1940 the first British. The sequence trap matters more than usual here — White was dissatisfied with the book and cut it heavily, trimming nearly a hundred pages and retitling it 'The Queen of Air and Darkness' for The Once and Future King (Collins, 1958). The 1939 Putnam and 1940 Collins are the only editions of the original, longer, more farcical text.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
Watch the Putnam 'Arthurian Trilogy' boxed set (The Sword in the Stone / The Witch in the Wood / The Ill-Made Knight), which gathers the US first editions and is traded as a unit — the volumes inside can be genuine firsts, so check each copyright page individually rather than trusting the box. The 1958 Once and Future King omnibus is a revised text under a new title, not a reprint of this book, and cannot be a first of this title. Modern facsimile and print-on-demand reissues are reprints. No book-club issue of the 1939 Putnam is documented in the sources consulted, and no club tell should be asserted without one.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *The Witch in the Wood* by T. H. White a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/the-witch-in-the-wood
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.