WHITMAN, Walt

Specimen Days & Collect

First edition, second issue with the McKay imprint. Some modest erosion to the cloth on the spine, paper over the front hinge starting, else a very good copy. Very nicely Inscribed by Whitman to a fellow author: "To Churchill Williams from his friend the Author with love. December 27, 1883." Francis (or Frank) Churchill Williams was the son of a successful playwright, and an 1891 graduate of the University of Pennsylvania (where he was Class President in his Senior year). Aside from publishing two novels (including an interesting portrait of Philadelphia politics, J. Devlin, Boss), he was an active member of the Philadelphia publishing world, as a journalist, editor, and publisher. He apparently was well-known to most of the literary figures of the time, and is recorded as a guest at Mark Twain's 70th birthday party. Something of a literary prodigy at Germantown Academy where he attended high school, Whitman's inscription was written to Williams when he was 14 years old, a freshman at Germantown, and already winning literary prizes. Presumably Whitman, ensconced across the river in Camden, was warmly acquainted with young Williams, as the affectionate inscription would seem to indicate. Whitman was an active and agreeable signer, but for whatever reason, Specimen Days isn't often found signed by its author, especially with this degree of affection.

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