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Cheever: A Life
by Bailey, Blake
- New
- Hardcover
- first
- Condition
- New/New
- ISBN 10
- 1400043948
- ISBN 13
- 9781400043941
- Seller
-
Charlotte Hall, Maryland, United States
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
New York, New York, U.S.A.: Knopf, 2009. 1st Edition . Hardcover. New/New. 8vo - over 7¾ - 9¾" tall. First Edition stated, no writing, marks, underlining, or bookplates. No remainder marks. Spine is tight and crisp. Boards are flat and true and the corners are square. Dust jacket is not price-clipped. This collectible, " NEW" condition first edition/first printing copy is protected with a polyester archival dust jacket cover. Beautiful collectible copy. Unread. GIFT QUALITY
Synopsis
From the acclaimed author of A Tragic Honesty: The Life and Work of Richard Yates comes the unforgettable life of John Cheever (1912--1982), a man who spent much of his career impersonating a perfect suburban gentleman, the better to become one of the foremost chroniclers of postwar America. "I was born into no true class," Cheever mused in his journal, "and it was my decision, early in life, to insinuate myself into the middle class, like a spy, so that I would have an advantageous position of attack, but I seem now and then to have forgotten my mission and to have taken my disguises too seriously." Written with unprecedented access to essential sources--including Cheever's massive journal, only a fraction of which has ever been published--Blake Bailey's biography reveals the troubled but strangely lovable man behind the disguises, an artist who delighted in the everyday radiance of the world while yearning, above all, "to be illustrious."Cheever's was a soul in conflict: he was a proud Yankee who flaunted his lineage while deploring the provincialism of his Quincy, Massachusetts, family circle; a high-school dropout who published his first story at eighteen; a pioneer of suburban realist fiction who continually pushed the boundaries of realism; a dire alcoholic who recovered to write the great novel Falconer; a secret bisexual who struggled with his longings and his fierce homophobia in a revolving door of self-loathing and hedonism. We see a man who concealed his anxieties behind the mask of a genial Westchester squire--a paterfamilias in Brooks Brothers clothes whose world was peopled by legendary writers and beautiful women (Malcolm Cowley, Saul Bellow, William Maxwell, Hope Lange, and John Updike, among them); whose groundbreaking work landed him on the covers of Time and Newsweek; a man whose demons and desperation were never quite vanquished by the joy he found in his work.Blake Bailey has written a luminous biography, a revelation of a writer of timeless fiction and of the man behind the page.From the Hardcover edition.
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Details
- Bookseller
- rarefirstscom
(US)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 005879
- Title
- Cheever: A Life
- Author
- Bailey, Blake
- Format/Binding
- Hardcover
- Book Condition
- New New
- Jacket Condition
- New
- Quantity Available
- 1
- Edition
- 1st Edition
- ISBN 10
- 1400043948
- ISBN 13
- 9781400043941
- Publisher
- Knopf
- Place of Publication
- New York, New York, U.S.A.
- Date Published
- 2009
- Size
- 8vo - over 7¾ - 9¾
Terms of Sale
rarefirstscom
30 day return guarantee, with full refund including original shipping costs for up to 30 days after delivery if an item arrives misdescribed or damaged.
About the Seller
rarefirstscom
Biblio member since 2013
Charlotte Hall, Maryland
About rarefirstscom
RAREFIRSTS.COM specializes in affordable quality first editions/first printings of both classic and contemporary literature. Our pricing is very competitive and our quality will exceed your expectations. We help build great literature collections for both individuals and institutions. Our stock of both classic and contemporary literature is too large to list all titles...so query us if you don't see what you need or want. If its not in inventory, we generally can obtain a quality copy very quickly for you...and at a reasonable price. Our founder is a former journalist and newspaper publisher who, in his second career, retired after 31 years at the Library of Congress where he was an administrator of a national library service for individuals who are blind or physically handicapped. RAREFIRSTS.COM offers quality literature with professional integrity at very reasonable prices.
Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- Tight
- Used to mean that the binding of a book has not been overly loosened by frequent use.
- Spine
- The outer portion of a book which covers the actual binding. The spine usually faces outward when a book is placed on a shelf....
- Crisp
- A term often used to indicate a book's new-like condition. Indicates that the hinges are not loosened. A book described as crisp...
- Remainder
- Book(s) which are sold at a very deep discount to alleviate publisher overstock. Often, though not always, they have a remainder...
- Jacket
- Sometimes used as another term for dust jacket, a protective and often decorative wrapper, usually made of paper which wraps...
- First Edition
- In book collecting, the first edition is the earliest published form of a book. A book may have more than one first edition in...
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