Poems from William Blake's Songs of Innocence

(SENDAK, Maurice):

Poems from William Blake's Songs of Innocence.

London: [The Stellar Press for] The Bodley Head, [1967]. Eight illustrations by Maurice Sendak (including one repeat: title/p.11), each printed in sanguine. 12mo.,19 pp. + [1] colophon; semi-stiff covers with wrap-around pictorial paper dust-jacket, spine stitched as issued (spine ends lightly rubbed).

PRESENTATION COPY Inscribed in ink on front free-endpaper: "Dear Sylvia – Mit Liebe! Maurice & Gene". The recipient, Sylvia Milgram, was Teacher-Coordinator for the Bureau of Art, New York City Board of Education and a Lecturer at the Museum of Modern Art, New York [d. 2000]. Gene is Eugene Glynn (1926-2007), psychoanalyst and Maurice Sendak's partner for more than fifty years.

First and only printing, limited to 275 copies issued as a Christmas keepsake for presentation to friends of the publisher and of the artist. No copies were ever offered for sale at the time of publication. While on a promotional tour for the British publication of Where the Wild Things Are in northern England (May 1967), Maurice Sendak suffered a major heart attack and he attributes his survival to the quick thinking of his editor Judy Taylor in getting him to a hospital. In appreciation he prepared the drawings for this volume, which was privately printed and distributed by The Bodley Head. Hanrahan A69.