I haven’t added to my Durrell collection since I posted photos of it on this blog at the request of Jeff Vandermeer back in April of last year. But I did miss out a couple of items, so I thought I’d show them off.
First up, Down the Styx
Here are three poetry collections…
… And a pair of plays.
Two poetry chapbooks – On the Suchness of the Old Boy
Durrell’s first two novels, finally republished after 73 years by ELS Editions of the University of Victoria, Canada. I’ll be writing about Pied Piper of Lovers here soon.
I also have quite a few first editions by Anthony Burgess, and I might stick photos of them up here. And there’s my Nicholas Monsarrat collection too. Neither are as extensive, or contain as many rare items, as my Durrell collection, however.
Filed under: book porn, books, lawrence durrell
My comment?Holy fuck, Ian, those are beautiful editions and you’re right to show them off. Good on you for revering an author to the extent that you create a literary shrine. I’m not a fan of Durrell’s, you know that, but I can see how others would be drawn to his work. You have a stunning collection and good on you.
Well, I wouldn’t call it a “shrine”…
Now this is high class book porn. Very nice.I’ve some Burgess first editions myself, though none in particularly good condition (plus lots of C19th 1st eds, of diverse quality), but I envy you your Durrells.
[...] Others…. The Heinlein is the first true sf novel I recall reading – a friend lent it to me at school. So it’s effectively the book that turned me into a sf fan. And The Alexandria Quartet is the book that turned me into a fan of Durrell’s writing – for evidence of this see here and here. [...]
[...] This is In Arcadia, a signed and numbered chapbook published in 1968 by Turret Books. It contains the eponymous poem by Lawrence Durrell, and music by Wallace Southam. The pair did two such chapbooks – I’ve had the other one, Nothing is Lost, Sweet Self, for a while (see this Lawrence Durrell collection post here). [...]
[...] London, of course. But never mind. Lawrence Durrell is my favourite writer – see here and here – and on a purely sentence-by-sentence level I believe there has been no finer writer in the [...]