Mila 18.

URIS, Leon.

Item Number: 116967

Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, 1961.

First edition of Uris’ classic novel about the Warsaw Uprising. Octavo, original cloth. Presentation copy, inscribed by the author on the front free endpaper to Harry Saltzman, co-producer of the James Bond film series, “For Harry with affection Shalom Leon Uris.” Near fine in a very good price-clipped dust jacket. Jacket drawing by Harlan Krakowitz. Jacket design by Al Nagy.

Mila 18 is a novel by Leon Uris set in German-occupied Warsaw, Poland, before and during World War II. Mila 18 debuted at #7 on The New York Times Best Seller List (the second-highest debut of any Uris novel ever, bested only by the #6 debut of Trinity in 1976) and peaked at #2 in August 1961.[1] Leon Uris's work, based on real events, covers the Nazi occupation of Poland and the atrocities of systematically dehumanising and eliminating the Jewish people of Poland. The name "Mila 18" is taken from the headquarters bunker of Jewish resistance fighters underneath the building at ulica Miła 18 (18 Mila Street, in English, 18 Pleasant Street). (See Miła 18.) The term ghetto takes on a clearer meaning as the courageous Jewish leaders fight a losing battle against not only the Nazis and their henchmen, but also profiteers and collaborators among themselves. Eventually, as the ghetto is reduced to rubble, a few courageous individuals with few weapons and no outside help assume command of ghetto defense, form a makeshift army and make a stand.