Search Results: Authors starting with N from Raptis Rare Books

Norfolk, CT: New Directions, 1941. First edition, second issue of Nabokov's first novel published in English. Octavo, original cloth. In near fine condition The Real Life of Sebastian Knight is a perversely magical literary detective story -- subtle, intricate, leading to a tantalizing climax -- about the mysterious life of a famous writer. Many people knew things about Sebastian Knight as a distinguished novelist, but probably fewer than a dozen knew of the two love affairs that so profoundly influenced his career, the second one in such a disastrous way. After Knight's death, his half brother sets out to penetrate the enigma of his life, starting with a few scanty clues in the novelist's private papers. His search proves to be a story as intriguing as any of his subject's own novels, as baffling, and, in the end, as uniquely rewarding.

Paris: The Olympia Press, 1955. First edition of Nabokov's masterpiece, published in Paris by the Olympia Press in 1955. First issue with the price of 900 francs on the rear panel of each volume. Octavo, 2 volumes, original green wrappers. In very good condition with light rubbing, some toning to the extremities. Ownership names and newspaper clipping tipped in. "Brilliant One of the funniest and one of the saddest books that will be published this year" (New York Times). "Lolita blazes with a perversity of a most original kind, for Mr. Nabokov has distilled from his shocking material hundred-proof intellectual farce. Lolita seems an assertion of the power of the comic spirit to wrest delight and truth from the most outlandish materials. It is one of the funniest serious novels I have ever read; and the vision of its abominable hero, who never deludes or excuses himself, brings into grotesque relief the cant, the vulgarity, and the hypocritical conventions that pervade the human… Read More

New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1966. First American edition of this inventive and richly derisive story of Hermann, a man who undertakes the perfect crime--his own murder. Octavo, original cloth. Near fine in a near fine price-clipped dust jacket with a touch of rubbing. A very sharp example. Despair is the seventh novel by Vladimir Nabokov, originally published in Russian, serially in the politicized literary journal Sovremennye zapiski during 1934. It was then published as a book in 1936, and translated to English by the author in 1937. It is generally acclaimed as one of Nabokov's better Russian novels, along with Invitation to a Beheading and The Gift (1938), and has a reasonable volume of literary criticism. Martin Amis ranked it second on his list of best Nabokov novels, with it trailing only Lolita.

New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc, 1977. First edition of this collection of memorial essays honoring the life and work of Vladimir Nabokov. Octavo, original cloth. Gilt titles and tooling to the spine and front panel. In fine condition. Russian-American novelist Vladimir Nabokov's first writings were in Russian, but he achieved his greatest fame with the novels he wrote in the English language, including his masterpiece Lolita. Contributors to this work include Harold W. McGraw, Jr. who published the majority of Nabokov's works in English, Alfred Appel, Jr., Alfred Kazan, John Updike and Nabokov's son who often translated his work, Dmitri.

Norfolk, Connecticut: New Directions, 1959. First edition of the reissue of Nabokov's first novel in English. Octavo, original cloth. Near fine in a near fine dust jacket. Jacket design by Ivan Chermayeff. Drawing by Michael Train. A nice example. The Real Life of Sebastian Knight is a perversely magical literary detective story -- subtle, intricate, leading to a tantalizing climax -- about the mysterious life of a famous writer. Many people knew things about Sebastian Knight as a distinguished novelist, but probably fewer than a dozen knew of the two love affairs that so profoundly influenced his career, the second one in such a disastrous way. After Knight's death, his half brother sets out to penetrate the enigma of his life, starting with a few scanty clues in the novelist's private papers. His search proves to be a story as intriguing as any of his subject's own novels, as baffling, and, in the end, as uniquely rewarding.

New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1955. First edition, early impression of Nabokov's lyrical masterwork. Octavo, original half cloth. Signed by Vladimir Nabokov on the half-title page with an additional drawing of a butterfly. An accomplished lepidopterist, Nabokov only included butterfly drawings in books presented to those especially important to him. Near fine in a near fine price-clipped dust jacket. Author photograph by Maclean Damcron. Housed in a custom clamshell box. Rare and desirable signed. "Brilliant. One of the funniest and one of the saddest books that will be published this year" (New York Times). "Lolita blazes with a perversity of a most original kind, for Mr. Nabokov has distilled from his shocking material hundred-proof intellectual farce. Lolita seems an assertion of the power of the comic spirit to wrest delight and truth from the most outlandish materials. It is one of the funniest serious novels I have ever read; and the vision of its abominable hero, who never… Read More

New York: Phaedra, 1965. First edition of this short novel by the author of Lolita. Octavo, original cloth. Fine in a very good dust jacket. Translated by Dmitri Nabokov. Originally written in 1930, The Eye is Vladimir Nabokov's fourth novel. It was translated into English by the author's son Dmitri Nabokov in 1965. At just over 100 pages, The Eye is Nabokov's shortest novel. Nabokov himself referred to it as a 'little novel' and it is a work that sits somewhere around the boundary between extended short story and novella. It was produced during a hiatus in Nabokov's creation of short stories between 1927 and 1930 as a result of his growing success as a novelist. As in many of Nabokov's early works, the characters are largely Russian emigres relocated to Europe, specifically Berlin. In this case, the novel is set in two houses where a young Russian tutor, Smurov, is renting room and board.

Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, 1957. Pnin is a professor of Russian at an American college who takes the wrong train to deliver a lecture in a language he cannot master. Pnin is a tireless lover who writes to his treacherous Liza: "A genius needs to keep so much in store, and thus cannot offer you the whole of himself as I do." Pnin is the focal point of subtle academic conspiracies he cannot begin to comprehend, yet he stages a faculty party to end all faculty parties forever. "Nabokov writes prose the only way it should be written, that is, ecstatically" (John Updike).

London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1960. First British edition of Nabokov's first novel written in America. Octavo, original cloth. Fine in a very good dust jacket with toning to the spine. Jacket design by Eric Ayers. Bend Sinister was the first novel he wrote while living in America and the most overtly political novel he ever wrote. While it is filled with veiled puns and characteristically delightful wordplay, it is, first and foremost, a haunting and compelling narrative about a civilized man caught in the tyranny of a police state. It is first and foremost a compelling narrative about a civilized man and his child caught up in the tyranny of a police state. Professor Adam Krug, the country's foremost philosopher, offers the only hope of resistance to Paduk, dictator and leader of the Party of the Average Man. In a folly of bureaucratic bungling and ineptitude, the government attempts to co-opt Krug's support in order to validate the new regime.

London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1959. First British edition of Nabokov's masterpiece. Octavo, original cloth. Near fine in a near fine dust jacket. Jacket designed by Eric Ayers. A very sharp example. One of the most celebrated books in history, Nabokov's Lolita quickly attained classic status upon publication in 1955. Notable for its controversial subject, the novel was adapted into a film by Stanley Kubrick in 1962, and again in 1997 by Adrian Lyne in addition to several adaptations for stage. "Lolita blazes with a perversity of a most original kind. For Mr. Nabokov has distilled from his shocking material hundred-proof intellectual farce. Lolita seems an assertion of the power of the comic spirit to wrest delight and truth from the most outlandish materials. It is one of the funniest serious novels I have ever read; and the vision of its abominable hero, who never deludes or excuses himself, brings into grotesque relief the cant, the vulgarity, and the hypocritical conventions that pervade the… Read More

New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1947. First edition of Nabokov's first novel written in America. Octavo, original cloth. Fine in a near fine dust jacket. An exceptional example. Bend Sinister was the first novel he wrote while living in America and the most overtly political novel he ever wrote. While it is filled with veiled puns and characteristically delightful wordplay, it is, first and foremost, a haunting and compelling narrative about a civilized man caught in the tyranny of a police state. It is first and foremost a compelling narrative about a civilized man and his child caught up in the tyranny of a police state. Professor Adam Krug, the country's foremost philosopher, offers the only hope of resistance to Paduk, dictator and leader of the Party of the Average Man. In a folly of bureaucratic bungling and ineptitude, the government attempts to co-opt Krug's support in order to validate the new regime.

New York: McGraw-Hill Company, 1973. First McGraw-Hill edition of Nabokov's first novel written in America. Octavo, original cloth. Fine in a near fine dust jacket. Jacket design by Stan Skardinski. Bend Sinister was the first novel he wrote while living in America and the most overtly political novel he ever wrote. While it is filled with veiled puns and characteristically delightful wordplay, it is, first and foremost, a haunting and compelling narrative about a civilized man caught in the tyranny of a police state. It is first and foremost a compelling narrative about a civilized man and his child caught up in the tyranny of a police state. Professor Adam Krug, the country's foremost philosopher, offers the only hope of resistance to Paduk, dictator and leader of the Party of the Average Man. In a folly of bureaucratic bungling and ineptitude, the government attempts to co-opt Krug's support in order to validate the new regime.

London: Editions Poetry London, 1947. First British edition of Nabokov's criticism of the work of Russian literary master Nikolai Gogol. Octavo, original cloth. Engraved frontispiece portrait of Gogol. Near fine in a good dust jacket. One of the preeminent figures of the natural school of Russian literary realism, Nikolai Gogol produced a prolific body of work throughout the mid 19th century. His early works, such as Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka, were influenced by his Ukrainian upbringing while his later writings satirised political corruption in the Russian Empire.

New York: New Directions Books, 1944. First edition this collection of Nabokov's translations of the major Russian poets. Octavo, original wrappers. Near fine in a near fine dust jacket. Russian-American novelist Vladimir Nabokov's first writings were in Russian, but he achieved his greatest fame with the novels he wrote in the English language. As a trilinqual master, Nabokov not only translated many his own early works into English, but expertly translated the works of many Russia's most important poets and novelists including Alexander Pushkin and Fyodor Tyutchev.

New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1957. Like Kafka's The Castle, Invitation to a Beheading embodies a vision of a bizarre and irrational world. In an unnamed dream country, the young man Cincinnatus C. is condemned to death by beheading for "gnostical turpitude," an imaginary crime that defies definition. Cincinnatus spends his last days in an absurd jail, where he is visited by chimerical jailers, an executioner who masquerades as a fellow prisoner, and by his in-laws, who lug their furniture with them into his cell. When Cincinnatus is led out to be executed, he simply wills his executioners out of existence: they disappear, along with the whole world they inhabit.

New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1955. First American edition and first trade edition of Nabokov's masterpiece. Octavo, bound in full morocco by the Harcourt Bindery, gilt titles and tooling to the spine in six compartments within raised gilt bands, gilt ruling to the front and rear panels, gilt inner dentelles stamp-signed by the Harcourt Bindery, marbled endpapers, all edges gilt. In fine condition. An exceptional presentation. One of the most celebrated books in history, Nabokov's Lolita quickly attained classic status upon publication in 1955. Notable for its controversial subject, the novel was adapted into a film by Stanley Kubrick in 1962, and again in 1997 by Adrian Lyne in addition to several adaptations for stage. "Lolita blazes with a perversity of a most original kind. For Mr. Nabokov has distilled from his shocking material hundred-proof intellectual farce. Lolita seems an assertion of the power of the comic spirit to wrest delight and truth from the most outlandish… Read More

London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1964. First edition of this early Nabokov novel, which tells the tragic story of a man destroyed by his own genius and of the hopeless efforts of the wife who loves him to save him from himself. Octavo, original cloth. Fine in a near fine price-clipped dust jacket. Jacket design by John Curtis. Uncommon in the original dust jacket. Nabokov's third novel, The Defense, is a chilling story of obsession and madness. As a young boy, Luzhin was unattractive, distracted, withdrawn, sullen--an enigma to his parents and an object of ridicule to his classmates. He takes up chess as a refuge from the anxiety of his everyday life. His talent is prodigious and he rises to the rank of grandmaster--but at a cost: in Luzhin' s obsessive mind, the game of chess gradually supplants the world of reality. His own world falls apart during a crucial championship match, when the intricate defense he has devised withers under his opponent's unexpected and unpredictable lines… Read More

New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1966. First revised edition of Nabokov's autobiography. Octavo, original cloth. Fine in a near fine price-clipped dust jacket. An exceptional example. Speak, Memory, first published in 1951 as Conclusive Evidence and then assiduously revised in 1966, is an elegant and rich evocation of Nabokov's life and times, even as it offers incisive insights into his major works, including Lolita, Pnin, Despair, The Gift, The Real Life of Sebastian Knight, and The Defense.

New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1964. First edition of this early Nabokov novel, which tells the tragic story of a man destroyed by his own genius and of the hopeless efforts of the wife who loves him to save him from himself. Octavo, original cloth. Fine in a very good dust jacket, name to the front free endpaper. Translated by Michael Scammel in collaboration with the author. Uncommon in this condition. Nabokov's third novel, The Defense, is a chilling story of obsession and madness. As a young boy, Luzhin was unattractive, distracted, withdrawn, sullen--an enigma to his parents and an object of ridicule to his classmates. He takes up chess as a refuge from the anxiety of his everyday life. His talent is prodigious and he rises to the rank of grandmaster--but at a cost: in Luzhin' s obsessive mind, the game of chess gradually supplants the world of reality. His own world falls apart during a crucial championship match, when the intricate defense he has devised withers under his… Read More

New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1972. First edition of Nabokov's 1972 novella. Octavo, original black cloth. Near fine in a near fine dust jacket, inscription to the front free endpaper. Photographic portrait of Nabokov on the rare panel of dust jacket by Halsman.