Between the Covers

Hardcover. First edition. Small, thin quarto. Illustrated by Edward Burra. Red cloth spine with tartan-design papercovered boards with applied title label. A fine copy, with none of the usual rubbing. A Powell rarity, one of approximately 100 copies, a long poem prepared for his wedding by friends. This copy Inscribed to Jonathan Cecil, the son of David Cecil who was Powell's boon companion when they both were at Eton, with over twenty corrections and emendations in Powell's hand – mostly identifying those in the text whose identity had been protected with dashes. Laid in is a Typed Letter Signed by Powell to Cecil at a much later date: "I don't believe I ever gave your father this squib, the origins of which are in my memoirs... I made up the verses during a period of insomnia. A drunken friend had about a hundred printed as a wedding present by a still more drunken printer."

Item #94641