Collected Poems 1947-1980.

GINSBERG, Allen.

$475.00

Item Number: 146470

New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1988.

First Perennial Library edition of this collection of poems. Octavo, original red wrappers. Association copy, lengthily inscribed by the author to his cousin Gene Levy and his wife on the title page, “for Ed [sic] & Lorraine Levy from Allen Ginsberg February 22, 1989,” and the opposite blank, “Shalom with thanks for Under The Bamboo Tree, Memphis Minnie, & your book on  J.W. Johnson from Cousin Allen,” above a hand-drawn doodle of a sun with initials “AH” in the center and a Star of David with a skull in the middle, holding a flower over crossbones. In very good condition. An excellent inscription.

Gathered here for the first time is the verse of three decades of one of America's greatest poets, Collected Poems 1947-1980 includes all writings in the groundbreaking paperback volumes published by City Lights Books, the contents of many rare pamphlets issued by small presses, and, finally, some notable texts hitherto unpublished—one, "Many Loves," withheld "for reasons of prudence and modesty," is an erotic rhapsody dating from the historic "San Francisco Renaissance" era.