Private Angelo

London: Privately Printed McCorquodale & Co., 1957. Hard Back. Very Good/No Dust Jacket. 4 3/4" x 7 1/2. Gentleman, David. 234 Pages. No marks or stamps. Cover and spine show light wear and fading. Some interior text pages show very light wrinklin' to otherwise flawless pages. Dedicated to The Eighth Army in its new clothers: an entertainment for virtue. Two thousand copies were printed at Christmas 1957 for Sir Allen Lane and Richard Lane by McCorquodale & Com Ltd. London, and bound by the Dorstel Press Ltd, Harlow, Essex. Very attractive endpapers with a mix of villagers and soldiers designed by David Gentleman and printed by Lowe & Brydone Ltd., London. The book was composed entirely without metal type: it is the first to have been produced n Great Britain by means of photocomposition on the Intertype Fotosetter. This book was first published in 1946 and later made into a film of the same name with Peter Ustinov. It covers the misadventures of an Italian soldier during World War II. The offspring of an English father and an Italian mother, Angelo was unwillingly drafted into the Italian army, with Count Pontefiore, Commanding Officer of the 914th Regiment of Tuscan Infantry, as his colonel. Not only was the Count Angelo's patron, but he was also a former lover of Angelo's mother. The novel opens with the Italian armistice of 1943, and traces the fortunes of Angelo as he sought to survive and regain a measure of control over his life during the turmoils of the war. He was lacking in dono di coraggio (gift of courage), an annoying but life-saving characteristic, Angelo strove to maintain his cheerfulness and beautiful voice in chaotic circumstances beyond his control.