Poems 1940-1953.

Signed by the author. This is a very good first edition of a brilliant poetry collection, signed by the poet, Karl Shapiro. His poetry had received early recognition, winning a number of awards in the 1940s including the Pulitzer Prize, a Guggenheim fellowship, an Academy of Arts and Letters Grant, and the Contemporary Poetry Prize. He served as the United States' poet laureate from 1946-1947.

Shapiro outlined how he felt his work and his Jewish identity fit into mid-century America in an interview with the Paris Review, 'I've always had this feeling—I've heard other Jews say—that when you can't find any other explanation for the Jews, you say, "Well, they are poets"...The poet is in exile whether he is or he is not...I always thought of myself as being both in and out of society at the same time'.

First edition, signed by the author in pen to title page; 8vo; light offsetting on endpapers; publisher's black and yellow cloth, spine lettered in yellow, publisher's blind stamp on upper cover, a very good copy with original typographic dust-jacket, spine lettering faded, front flap of dust-jacket clipped at the top and price-stamped at the bottom, moderate nicks & tears to edges and corners; [xii], 161pp.