HIROSHIMA - LIMITED EDITION, SIGNED

New York: The Limited Editions Club, 1983. Limited Edition. A masterful production by The Limited Editions Club of Hersey's 1946 book, chronicling the stories of six survivors of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Hersey's work comprised the entirety of the August 31, 1946 issue of The New Yorker, and was subsequently published in book format a few months later by Alfred A. Knopf. In addition to a new afterword by the author, and a poem by Robert Penn Warren ("New Dawn: Hiroshima"), this edition features eight full-page silkscreen prints by renown African American painter Jacob Lawrence. In his artist's note, he mentioned going into mental retreat after reading the book. "Because this book is such a strong statement of man's inhumanity to man, I found this work to be a most challenging book to illustrate. In my attempt to meet the challenge, I read and reread Hiroshima several times and, in doing so, I began to see the great devastation in the twisted and mutilated bodies of humans, birds, fishes and all the other animals and living things that inherit our earth. The flora and the fauna and the land that were at one time alive, were now seared, mangled, deformed and devoid of life. And I thought, what have we accomplished over these many centuries? We have produced great geniuses in music, the sciences, the arts, dance, literature, architecture and oratory among many other disciplines. And we have in the meantime developed the means to destroy, in a most horrible manner, that life that is our God-given right." LEC Bibliography No.535. One of 1,500 numbered copies specially bound and signed by all contributors, this being copy no.573. Quarto (32.75cm); full black aniline leather, with title embossed onto front cover; all edges stained black; publisher's original black cloth slipcase; unpaged; illustrated throughout with eight silkscreen prints by Jacob Lawrence, printed in 11 colors, each with an interleaved tissue guard. Fine in a Near Fine slipcase, with some light external wear, and some minor separation to the inner cloth lining around the lower opening.