Blood Meridian, 25th Anniversary edition Random House/Modern Library, New York, 2010. First 25th Anniversary edition, so stated on front cover, first printing with a full number-line on copyright page. Hardcover, 21,8 x 14,7 cm, 351 numbered pages. Publisher’s beige paper covered and cloth boards lettered in brown on spine and with the Modern Library logo embossed on the front panel.
Blood Meridian, first English edition, review copy. Picador, London, 1989.First English edition, first and only printing with complete number line from 9 to 1 on the copyright page. Hardcover, 22 x 14,5 cm, 337 numbered pages. Publisher’s red cloth lettered in white on the spine. White dust jacket lettered in red and black with a wraparound illustration by George Sharp. Price of “U.K. £11.95” on the back flap.
Blood Meridian, uncorrected proof of the first English edition. Picador, London, 1988-1989. Uncorrected proof of the first English edition. Softcover, 21 x 13,8 cm, 337 numbered pages. Red wrappers lettered in black on the front panel, which states: “Uncorrected proof copy on proofing paper and the property of the publisher and not for sale” (APG 005c).
This is neither a Cormac McCarthy bibliography, as I am not a bibliographer, nor a critical essay, as I am not a scholar. The project started three years ago when I retired. Having more free time, I thought it would be good to catalogue my collection of McCarthy books. However, as I delved into them, I realized that many details about publication, first print runs, different issues, and so on were unknown, not based on strong sources, or even definitely wrong. Moreover, some of the people to whom the books were inscribed were similarly little known and had interesting stories worth telling.
So, I started digging into relevant archives mainly in the United States and England, speaking with McCarthy’s friends, publishers, and scholars, reading critical and biographical essays. What you find on this website is part of this research outcome. It aims just to share with McCarthy lovers, collectors, scholars and book dealers, information which sheds light on some little known aspects of McCarthy’s books history and about people whose lives crossed that of the author of Blood Meridian.
This is obviously a work in progress. In the next weeks, I will add information on all the over 250 items included in my McCarthy collection. Register with your email address to receive notifications about new contents added.
Lastly, English is not my mother tongue, so please be forgiving of any errors you may find in the text. Happy reading.
La Route (The Road), graphic novel, adapted by Manu Larcenet, second limited edition. Dargaud, Paris, 2024. Second limited edition, only printing. Hardcover, without a dustjacket as issued, 34 x 27.4 cm, 190 pages. Publisher’s gray thick cardboard covers, featuring two illustrations by Larcenet, differ from those of the first trade and first limited editions.
The books by Cormac McCarthy entered the rare books trade and the collecting world very early. As far as we know, McCarthy’s friend Gary Goodman was among the first to trade signed copies of The Orchard Keeper and Outer Dark.
On February, 1971 Goodman, having noted a few copies of The Orchard Keeper offered by second hand bookstores for more than the original price, purchased from Random House forty-five copies of Outer Dark and five copies of The Orchard Keeper (probably from the second printing) at a reduced price. He got them signed by McCarthy and resold them at $ 12.50 each. McCarthy was known to a narrow circle at the time and modern firsts market was just starting. Nominal prices were many hundred times lower than those usual today.