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Oranges
by McPhee, John
- Used
- Hardcover
- first
- Condition
- See description
- Seller
-
Deep River, Connecticut, United States
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
New York: Farrer Straus Giroux, 1967. First Edition. First printing Near fine in light blue cloth covered boards with the upper edge of the text block stained light yellow. The lower edges of the boards shows minor fading; otherwise the book is fine. In a fine unclipped dust jacket. A small octavo measuring 7 7/8" tall by 5 3/8" deep containing 149 pages of text. Warmly inscribed by the author on the title page and dated in 1969. The author's third book which has become rather uncommon.
Synopsis
A classic of reportage, Oranges was first conceived as a short magazine article about oranges and orange juice, but the author kept encountering so much irresistible information that he eventually found that he had in fact written a book. It contains sketches of orange growers, orange botanists, orange pickers, orange packers, early settlers on Florida's Indian River, the first orange barons, modern concentrate makers, and a fascinating profile of Ben Hill Griffin of Frostproof, Florida who may be the last of the individual orange barons. McPhee's astonishing book has an almost narrative progression, is immensely readable, and is frequently amusing. Louis XIV hung tapestries of oranges in the halls of Versailles, because oranges and orange trees were the symbols of his nature and his reign. This book, in a sense, is a tapestry of oranges, too—with elements in it that range from the great orangeries of European monarchs to a custom of people in the modern Caribbean who split oranges and clean floors with them, one half in each hand.
Read More: Identifying first editions of Oranges
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Details
- Bookseller
- Town's End Books
(US)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- TB22008
- Title
- Oranges
- Author
- McPhee, John
- Book Condition
- Used
- Edition
- First Edition
- Binding
- Hardcover
- Publisher
- Farrer Straus Giroux
- Place of Publication
- New York
- Date Published
- 1967
Terms of Sale
Town's End Books
30 day return guarantee, with full refund including shipping costs for up to 30 days after delivery if an item arrives misdescribed or damaged.
About the Seller
Town's End Books
Biblio member since 2009
Deep River, Connecticut
About Town's End Books
We purchase and sell only collectible first editions in a number of fields all focused on Americana. We are primarily mail order sellers; however, we are open by appointment and welcome visits from customers.
Glossary
Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:
- Jacket
- Sometimes used as another term for dust jacket, a protective and often decorative wrapper, usually made of paper which wraps...
- Fine
- A book in fine condition exhibits no flaws. A fine condition book closely approaches As New condition, but may lack the...
- First Edition
- In book collecting, the first edition is the earliest published form of a book. A book may have more than one first edition in...
- Cloth
- "Cloth-bound" generally refers to a hardcover book with cloth covering the outside of the book covers. The cloth is stretched...
- Text Block
- Most simply the inside pages of a book. More precisely, the block of paper formed by the cut and stacked pages of a book....
- Title Page
- A page at the front of a book which may contain the title of the book, any subtitles, the authors, contributors, editors, the...
- Inscribed
- When a book is described as being inscribed, it indicates that a short note written by the author or a previous owner has been...
- Edges
- The collective of the top, fore and bottom edges of the text block of the book, being that part of the edges of the pages of a...
- Octavo
- Another of the terms referring to page or book size, octavo refers to a standard printer's sheet folded four times, producing...
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