A SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT

NY: House of Books, 1940. 1st Edition. Hardcover. Very Good. Frost's ownership copy, and one of 26 lettered copies. First edition, limited to 250 copies; 26 copies lettered A -Z were published for private distribution. Colophon states Number 7 the House of Books' Crown Octavo Series, printed at The Golden Eagle Press of Mount Vernon, NY. Yellow cloth over boards, black lettering, lacking glassine. Limitation signed by Saroyan, this copy lettered "X", and then, in an unidentified hand in the same ink below Saroyan's signature the notation: "For presentation to Robert Frost on the day that he honored House of Books with his visit". The House of Books, founded by Louis and Margie Cohn in 1930 on 56th Street in Manhattan, was a purveyor of rare literary first editions; Wolfe and Hemingway were among their favored authors and friends. We might conjecture that the handwriting noting Frost's visit is Margie's, as she was the one at the House of Books who tended more to administrative matters. Curiously, taped onto the ffe is the part of the mailing envelope which bears the mailing label of The Book Shop, 270 Boylston Street, Boston, Mass with typed address of Mr. Robert Frost, 35 Brewster St. Cambridge Mass, which is date-stamped Dec 15, 194x, the last digit being unidentifiable. There may well not be any association between the House of Books notation and the Bookshop mailing label. The inclusion of the mailing label is puzzling; what we do know with certainty is that the book was sourced by us as described here, and by all evidence Frost's personal copy.