The Great Gatsby by FITZGERALD, F. Scott - 1926

London: Chatto & Windus, 1926. Hardcover. Fair. First English edition. Light blue cloth lettered in black, the remainder binding, one of 350 copies (the bibliographer Bruccoli had not seen this binding). A poor copy. Tiny neat name "W. Merriss" at top of the front fly, lacking nearly the top half of the spine, drink stains on the front board, hinges repaired, lacking the ridiculously rare dustwrapper. Housed in a custom cloth chemise and quarter morocco slipcase titled in gilt. Inscribed on the front free endpaper by Fitzgerald to Golden Age film director King Vidor: "For King Vidor / in admiration / and friendship / from / F. Scott "Gin" Fitzgerald. Paris, June 1928." Fitzgerald met Vidor when he worked in Hollywood as a screenwriter and later based a character in his controversial short-story, "Crazy Summer," on the famous director. The small owner's name is that of William Merriss, a close friend of Irvin S. Cobb's grandson, Thomas Cobb Brody, whose mother, Elisabeth "Buff" Cobb, was close with numerous young Hollywood types, including Fitzgerald and Sheilah Graham. When Fitzgerald died suddenly of a heart attack, Graham wrote "it was a few days before Christmas, and Mr. [Irwin] Cobb insisted that I stay with them until it was over. I loved them for their kindness." Accompanied by a letter of provenance which is a little confusing, but which seems to indicate that Brody gave the book to Merriss. The much rarer first English edition of an American classic with, according to various sources, as few as 1500-3000 copies printed versus 20,870 of the first American edition. Fitzgerald's perception of the lack of support he received from his English publishers was the source of great consternation to him. According to one source: "On 15 June 1925, William Collins, Fitzgerald's English publisher for *This Side of Paradise* and *The Beautiful and Damned*, turned down *The Great Gatsby*, declaring that "to publish *The Great Gatsby* would be to reduce the number of his readers rather than to increase them." About 25 years ago, when we sold an inscribed first UK edition to Fitzgerald's bibliographer Matthew Bruccoli, who was much respected but who also fit somewhere on the spectrum between curmudgeonly and irascible, he was nearly brought to tears because he had been looking for one for his entire collecting life and had until that time never seen one. Neither had we until now. An inscribed copy of one of the most beloved novels in American literature in a notoriously rare edition with a significant association. *Connolly 100*.