Catching the Light: Remembering Wallace Stegner (association copy)

Stanford, CA: Stanford University Libraries, 1996. First edition. Hardcover. Fine. An association copy: Unmarked, but from the library of one of the contributors, John Daniel, whose included tribute is "The Cultivated Wild of Wallace Stegner," an essay originally published in his first book The Trail Home.

This is copy 23 of 300 as stated on the colophon. Published to "honor Wallace Stegner on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the Stanford Creative Writing Program" (and three years after Stegner's death), the book's first part is a previously unpublished short essay "Catching the Light" by Stegner; after an insert of glossy black and white photos showing Stegner in some of his usual environments, the second part consists of remembrances and tributes by well-known western writers. In addition to John Daniel, writers include Barry Lopez, Terry Tempest Williams, William Kittredge, Gretel Ehrlich, Ivan Doig, Wendell Berry (his former student), James D. Houston, Charles Wilkinson, Page Stegner (his son), Jackson Benson (his biographer), and others. His bibliographer Nancy Colberg provides a chronology of his life at rear. 

John Daniel is a four-time recipient of the Oregon Book Awards among other honors. He started his career as a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University and afterward lived in a cottage on Stegner's property in Los Altos Hills for five years (during the years in which Stegner's last novel Crossing to Safety was written). His essay "The Cultivated Wild of Wallace Stegner" recalls his first early encounter with Stegner's "The Wilderness Letter" as well as the time Daniel spent keeping up the yard with Stegner and soaking up his quiet wisdom. A signed NF/NF copy of the Trail Home, in which this essay originally appeared, is also provided for further reading (in another essay, Stegner helps him clear out some pesky packrats from the cottage with a shotgun). Daniel also has written movingly about Stegner in his later collection The Far Corner.

Quarto in beige cloth, printed by the venerable Yolly Bolly Press. Gray-brown Fabriano endpapers and the interior letterpress on fine paper with uncut edges. In a gray-brown paper slipcase with a printed spine plate. A truly handsome production. Laid in is a brief letterpress prospectus on folded heavy paper. A fine book in a very near fine slipcase with one subtle bump near mid-spine. An excellent book and association.