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The Maltese Falcon (Special Edition) (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard Anniversary
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The Maltese Falcon (Special Edition) (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard Anniversary Edition) Paperback -

by Hammett, Dashiell

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UsedGood. Cover/Case has some rubbing and edgewear. Access codes, CD's, slipcovers and other accessories may not be included.
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About this book

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.

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First Edition Identification

Originally published in serial form in the magazine Black Mask, it was published in book form by Alfred A. Knopf in New York in 1930. Bound in grey cloth, the book is perhaps more well-known for its iconic yellow dust-jacket, with its deco typeface and stark image of a perched falcon. As is the custom for Alfred Knopf from this period, the first edition is recognizable by the absence of any statement of printing on the copyright page. The first state dust jacket has an advertisement on the rear panel for Hammett's other novels, priced at $2.00. 

One of the most desirable of all modern first editions, the Maltese Falcon can fetch upwards of $100,000 in a pristine first state jacket, and easily five figures in a second state jacket. 

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About the author

DASHIELL SAMUEL HAMMETT was born in St. Mary's County, Maryland. He grew up in Philadelphia and Baltimore. Hammett left school at the age of fourteen and held several kinds of jobs thereafter--messenger boy, newsboy, clerk, operator, and stevedore, finally becoming an operative for Pinkerton's Detective Agency. Sleuthing suited young Hammett, but World War I intervened, interrupting his work and injuring his health. When Sergeant Hammett was discharged from the last of several hospitals, he resumed detective work. He soon turned to writing, and in the late 1920s Hammett became the unquestioned master of detective-story fiction in America. In The Maltese Falcon (1930) he first introduced his famous private eye, Sam Spade. The Thin Man (1932) offered another immortal sleuth, Nick Charles. Red Harvest (1929), The Dain Curse (1929), and The Glass Key (1931) are among his most successful novels. During World War II, Hammett again served as sergeant in the Army, this time for more than two years, most of which he spent in the Aleutians. Hammett's later life was marked in part by ill health, alcoholism, a period of imprisonment related to his alleged membership in the Communist Party, and by his long-time companion, the author Lillian Hellman, with whom he had a very volatile relationship. His attempt at autobiographical fiction survives in the story "Tulip," which is contained in the posthumous collection The Big Knockover (1966, edited by Lillian Hellman). Another volume of his stories, The Continental Op (1974, edited by Stephen Marcus), introduced the final Hammett character: the "Op," a nameless detective (or "operative") who displays little of his personality, making him a classic tough guy in the hard-boiled mold--a bit like Hammett himself.

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