For Whom the Bell Tolls (German) by HEMINGWAY Ernest - 1941

1941. First Edition . Signed. HEMINGWAY, Ernest. Wem Die Stunde Schlägt (For Whom the Bell Tolls). Stockholm: Bermann-Fischer, 1941. Octavo, original white cloth, original dust jacket. $9200.First edition in German, Hemingway's own copy, inscribed, “For Frazer [sic] Bragg Drew, best wishes always, Ernest Hemingway. (Note how the Germans omitted the John Donne!) EH. ” As a young teacher, Drew wrote a letter to which Hemingway responded with uncharacteristic kindness, signing six of Drew's books and presenting him with six more ""as an act of contrition"" for taking so long to return the books. Hemingway then invited Drew to visit, and on April 8, 1955, one year after Hemingway won the Nobel Prize, they spent a long afternoon discussing literature, later recounted by Drew in his article ""Unedited Notes on a Visit to Finca Vigia"" (in Bruccoli, Conversations With Ernest Hemingway, 89-98). At the end of Drew's visit Hemingway said ""Let's go up to the house and sign those books of yours."" Hemingway inscribed all the books Drew had brought with him and presented him with many others from his own collection; this rare wartime publication is surely from the group signed that day. The inscription refers to the quotation from John Donne that the title comes from (""…send not to know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee""), printed at the front of the American first edition. For Whom the Bell Tolls first published in 1940; this first edition in German was translated by Paul Baudisch, by the publisher Bermann-Fischer, who had left Nazi Germany for Austria in 1936 only to forced to moved operations to Stockholm in 1938 after the Anschluss. As the situation deteriorated in Sweden, Bermann-Fischer eventually moved operations to New York . With advertising leaf and publisher's postcard laid in. Not in Grissom. With Professor Drew's bookplate.Faint dampstain to front board of book and dust jacket; mild toning to spine, minor wear to edges of dust jacket. A near-fine copy with a wonderful inscription.