The Harder They Fall.

SCHULBERG, Budd.

$400.00

Item Number: 120678

New York: Random House, 1947.

First edition of Schulberg’s second book, basis for the 1956 film directed by Mark Robson, featuring Humphrey Bogart’s final film role. Octavo, original cloth. Signed by Budd Schulberg on the front free endpaper. Near fine in a good dust jacket. Jacket design by Louis Glanzman.

Crowded with unforgettable characters, it is a relentless expose of the fight racket. A modern Samson in the form of a simple Argentine peasant is ballyhooed by an unscrupulous fight promoter and his press agent and then betrayed and destroyed by connivers. Schulberg creates a wonderfully authentic atmosphere for this book that many critics hailed as even better than What Makes Sammy Run? "The book will stand not only as the novel about boxing but also as a book that indirectly tells more about civilization than do most books about civilization itself" (Arthur Miller). It was the basis for the 1956 film directed by Mark Robson, written by Philip Yordan, starring Humphrey Bogart, Rod Steiger and Jan Sterling.