Fine Books & Manuscripts

CHANDLER, Raymond (1888–1959). The Simple Art of Murder. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1950. 8vo. Publisher’s yellowish gray cloth stamped with a yellow vertical Greek key roll to upper cover and letter in an orangish-yellow (covers lightly darkened at edges); facsimile dust jacket. FIRST EDITION, FIRST PRINTING. –– [Together with:] The Simple Art of Murder. London: Hamish Hamilton, [1950]. 8vo. Publisher’s blue cloth (endpapers foxed); original unclipped dust jacket (jacket laid down on stiff stock with rubbing along spine panel). FIRST ENGLISH EDITION, second impression. Bruccoli A9.1.a; A9.2.b. Chandler’s seminal critique on detective fiction.