TALES FROM SILVER LANDS

Garden City New York: Doubleday Page & Company, 1924. First edition. Very good plus.. First printing of "one of the first children's books to feature South American folktales from indigenous peoples" (Library of Congress) - inscribed by multiple-Pulitzer-winner Carl Sandburg, to whom the book is dedicated. Charles J. Finger, an eccentric socialist, adventurer, railway man, and sometimes-folklorist, was "encouraged and helped" early in his writing career by three-time Pulitzer Prize-winner Carl Sandburg (Library of Congress). In thanks for his his guidance, Finger dedicated to Sandburg what would become his "most famous" book, the winner of the 1925 Newbery Medal TALES FROM SILVER LANDS (Library of Congress). The collection features South and Central American folk tales, beautifully illustrated.
Sandburg inscribed this copy to Roger Barrett, son of eminent Abraham Lincoln collector Oliver R. Barrett; the elder Barrett was Sandburg's friend, lawyer, and collaborator. An attractive work with a provenance that illuminates a network of scholars. 9'' x 7''. Original black cloth binding with yellow stamping. Yellow pictorial endpapers of various mythological figures. Yellow, blue and green woodcut frontispiece with nine full-page yellow, blue, and green woodcuts and numerous smaller black-and-white woodcuts. [12], 226 pages. Inscribed to "Roger Barrett / - a bad, bad book / worth reading - Carl Sandburg." Binding with a touch of bumping to corners and spine ends, one tiny knock to lower board; a bit of a lean. Interior clean and bright.