NORTH GLADIOLA

New York City, NY: Harper & Row Publishers, 1985. First Edition. First Printing.. Hardcover. Fine/Fine Dust Jacket.. New York City, NY: Harper & Row Publishers, 1985. Hardcover. Fine/Fine. First Edition/First Printing. 265 pages. The author's second novel. One of James Wilcox's finest achievements. The First Hardcover Edition. Precedes and should not be confused with all other subsequent editions. Published in a small and limited first print run as a hardcover original only. The First Edition is now scarce. Presents James Wilcox's "North Gladiola". Tula Springs Revisited. Incidentally, this being Tula Springs, there is NO South Gladiola. So here, for the second time, is the fictional, unforgettably, lovably weird community of Tula Springs, Louisiana, described by the author with profound depths of vulnerable feeling, not just empathy. "Nothing is simple - or as gossip portrays it - in Tula Springs. But after all upheavals and sunders pass, Family and Community remain strongly connected" (Publisher's blurb). "Having read all Wilcox's books, I would be hard pressed to pick a favorite. But this is certainly one of the most entertaining. It is funny, touching, clever, and so very original". It is a crying shame that James Wilcox's entire body of work has not received the kind of universal recognition that it so richly deserves, otherwise accorded too many inferior, undeserving writers, products of American media hype. The reason is that he writes social comedy - there is no other kind in literature - which is looked down upon as the lesser art, not to be taken seriously, except, of course, by readers and critics who do take literature seriously. An absolute "must-have" title for James Wilcox collectors. This copy is very prominently and beautifully signed in black ink-pen on the title page by James Wilcox. It is signed directly on the page itself, not on a tipped-in page. This title is a late-modern classic. This is one of few such signed copies of the First Hardcover Edition/First Printing still available online and is in especially fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright. Please note: Copies available online have serious flaws, are in subsequent editions, or are remainder-marked. This is surely an accessible and lovely alternative. A scarce signed copy thus. "Modern Baptists" is regarded by Harold Bloom as one of the canonical works of the 20th century. One of the finest writers of the 20th century and our time. A fine copy. (SEE ALSO OTHER JAMES WILCOX TITLES IN OUR CATALOG). ISBN 0060154411.