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The Maltese Falcon

The Maltese Falcon

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The Maltese Falcon

by Dashiell Hammett

  • Used
  • very good
  • Hardcover
Condition
Very Good/Good+
Seller
Seller rating:
This seller has earned a 5 of 5 Stars rating from Biblio customers.
Winston, Georgia, United States
Item Price
NZ$353.10
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About This Item

New York: Modern Library (Random House), 1934. Hardcover. Very Good/Good+. 12mo - over 6¾ - 7¾" tall. See photos for details. Hardcover with dust jacket. First modern library edition thus with single date of 1934 listed on the copyright page (after the 1929 and 1930 Alfred A. Knopf editions). Dust jacket front flap shows 95 cents price and underside of DJ was 278 books. Red cloth boards with blue and gilt design, top page edge stained dark gray. Front and rear board has some spotting. Dust jacket shows edge chipping and tears and rear of DJ has short "lat 36" written in pen and page opposite half title has original owner name date penned. No binding issues noted.

Synopsis

The Maltese Falcon , author Dashiell Hammett’s third novel, set the standard by which all subsequent detective fiction would be judged. Set in San Francisco in the late 1920s, the novel introduces us to private detective Sam Spade, who characterizes the archetype of the hard-boiled detective in his dead-pan pursuit of the recovery of a black figurine. Having worked for a time for the Pinkerton Detective Agency in San Francisco, Hammett reportedly drew upon his years as a detective in creating Spade and many of the other characters for The Maltese Falcon . The Maltese Falcon was originally serialized in HL Mencken’s “pulp” magazine, Black Mask, beginning with the September 1929 issue. For publication of the book form, editor Blanche Knopf tried to tone down the overt sexuality of the magazine version, fearing the references would alienate readers, but Hammett prevailed. However, the 1941 film adaptation starring Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor (the best known of the novel’s three film versions) excised the homosexual subtext of the novel due to Production Code restraints. Today, the movie is considered a film noir classic and the novel is ranked 56th on Modern Library’s “100 Best” English-language novels of the 20th century as well as 54th on The Guardian’s list of the 100 best novels. -

Read More: Identifying first editions of The Maltese Falcon

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Details

Bookseller
Yesterday's Book Shop (Member IOBA) US (US)
Bookseller's Inventory #
2190471
Title
The Maltese Falcon
Author
Dashiell Hammett
Format/Binding
Hardcover
Book Condition
Used - Very Good
Jacket Condition
Good+
Quantity Available
1
Publisher
Modern Library (Random House)
Place of Publication
New York
Date Published
1934
Pages
267
Size
12mo - over 6¾ - 7¾
Bookseller catalogs
Collectible; Mystery;

Terms of Sale

Yesterday's Book Shop (Member IOBA)

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About the Seller

Yesterday's Book Shop (Member IOBA)

Seller rating:
This seller has earned a 5 of 5 Stars rating from Biblio customers.
Biblio member since 2021
Winston, Georgia

About Yesterday's Book Shop (Member IOBA)

Yesterday's Book Shop is an independent, family-owned establishment. The store first opened in 1966 under the name Collector's Corner and was located in Western Maryland. The Collector's Corner dealt mainly in books but also sold stamps and assorted ephemera. In 1975 the name was changed to Yesterday's Book Shop when the store only offered books and printed matter. In the early 2000s the brick and mortar store was closed and now we only sell online.

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Glossary

Some terminology that may be used in this description includes:

Copyright page
The page in a book that describes the lineage of that book, typically including the book's author, publisher, date of...
Jacket
Sometimes used as another term for dust jacket, a protective and often decorative wrapper, usually made of paper which wraps...
Gilt
The decorative application of gold or gold coloring to a portion of a book on the spine, edges of the text block, or an inlay in...
Cloth
"Cloth-bound" generally refers to a hardcover book with cloth covering the outside of the book covers. The cloth is stretched...
Half Title
The blank front page which appears just prior to the title page, and typically contains only the title of the book, although, at...
12mo
A duodecimo is a book approximately 7 by 4.5 inches in size, or similar in size to a contemporary mass market paperback. Also...
Chipping
A defect in which small pieces are missing from the edges; fraying or small pieces of paper missing the edge of a paperback, or...

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