[Photobook] Quiet Days In Clichy by [BRASSAI] MILLER, Henry (1891-1980) - 1958

Paris: The Olympia Press, 8, Rue de Nesle, 1958. Second Edition. Printed Wrappers. Fine-/Fine-. Second Edition of this short novel, celebrating love, art, and the Bohemian life, with 29 full-page photogravures (recto and verso, of which one verso only and one double-page photomontage) of Paris after dark by Brassai (pseudonym of Gyula Halász). Small 8vo (172 x 103mm): 171,[3]pp (because of a binding error, the blank leaf (pp. 175-176) of the first edition was inserted following p. 170, giving the appearance of two fewer pages). Original thick card wrappers with wraparound abstract design, by T. Tajiri, in grey, yellow, and black; text printed on thick white wove paper in dark brown ink. About Fine (slight spine lean, trivial edge wear) of this fragile volume. Shifreen & Jackson A100c. Kearney 1.16.2. Auer 364. O‘Roark Collection A182 (first edition). Originally published in 1956. Both Quiet Days in Clichy and the accompanying short story, "Mara-Marignan," date from the time of Tropic of Cancer, when Miller was an obscure, penniless writer in Paris. A few months after he returned to New York, in 1940, a quick moneymaking opportunity, writing pornography for an Oklahoma erotica collector, named Roy M. Johnson, came his way. Early drafts of "Mara-Marignan" and Quiet Days in Clichy were the result. Johnson was not impressed; he found Miller's prose to be "too poetic," and the manuscripts went missing—"lost for over ten years," Miller wrote in 1956—then "turned up miraculously." Miller rewrote both stories, in Big Sur, in May of that year. The photographs of 1930s Paris are of street-scenes of prostitutes; sailors fondling women in cafes, young people flirting, kissing, dancing, and drinking. N. B. With few exceptions (always identified), we only stock books in exceptional condition, carefully preserved in archival, removable mylar sleeves. All orders are packaged with care and posted promptly. Satisfaction guaranteed. (Fine Editions Ltd is a member of the Independent Online Booksellers Association, and we subscribe to its codes of ethics.).