The Vassall Affair.

WEST, Rebecca.

$950.00

Item Number: 145882

London: Sunday Telegraph, 1963.

First edition of this work by the author of Black Lamb and Grey Falcon. Octavo, original wrappers. Association copy, inscribed by the author in the year of publication on the half-title page, “My love to Bruce and Beatrice Rebecca West 1963.” The recipients, Bruce Gould and Beatrice Blackmar Gould were co-editors of the Ladies’ Home Journal for almost 27 years, from 1935 through 1962, including the golden years of the magazine. Time magazine wrote upon their 1962 retirement, the Goulds took an undistinguished journal in a field that “took the patronizing view that a woman’s interests were largely confined to the home” and led by “Beatrice’s sure feeling for the emancipated women’s tastes, it invited its readers to plunge up to the elbows not only in bread dough but in life.” The magazine pushed for “purity in politics as well as in maternity wards” and fought against venereal disease and child abuse. Attention-getting articles and addressing feminine health problems openly were published, as well as top fiction pieces.” In very good condition.

The Vassall Affair is a forgotten episode in the spy scandals that rocked Britain in the 1950's and 60's. This book is a personal perspective of the Public Inquiry by Rebecca West.