All the Pretty Horses, first English edition
Picador, London, 1993
First English edition, first printing with complete number line (135798642) on the copyright page. Hardcover, 22.2 x 14.8 cm, 301 numbered pages. Publisher’s white cloth lettered in silver on the spine. White dustjacket lettered in black. The front cover features a photograph by David Katzenstein and the novel’s title, all in lowercase. A price of “£14.99” is on the front flap, and a photograph of McCarthy by Marion Ettlinger on the back flap. The white back panel includes seven blurbs by Barry Lopez, Saul Bellow, Richard B. Woodward, Chicago Tribune, USA Today, Jim Harrison, and Pieter Matthiesen. (APG 006k).
Inscribed in black marker by McCarthy on the first half-title page to an American bookseller: “For James Cahill / All best wishes / Cormac McCarthy”.
CONDITION: near fine book in a fine dustjacket, a beautiful copy.
PROVENANCE: purchased from James Cahill.
Published on April 8, 1993, at £14.99, in a print run of 2,976 copies.
The source of the publication date and the number of copies printed, is the Picador records.
Knopf auctioned the United Kingdom rights to All the Pretty Horses in 1992. The book was sent to three publishers, Picador, Cape, and Secker and Warburg. David Godwin of Cape said it was “too American”. Peter Straus, who was Picador publisher from 1990 to 2002, outbid Robin Robertson of Secker, and secured the rights.
This copy was part of a small batch, four or five books, inscribed by McCarthy in the winter 1993-1994 to the dealer James Cahill.
A SIGNED ON A BOOKPLATE ISSUE?: APG noted an issue signed on a publisher’s tipped-in bookplate (006j). However, Peter Straus recalled in conversation with me that the bookplates signed by McCarthy were issued for the first English edition of The Crossing, not for All the Pretty Horses. This makes sense as, after the success of the first book in The Border Trilogy, The Crossing had a much larger first print run, about 12,000 copies, and Picador’s promotional campaign was significantly larger than that for the previously published book. Moreover, the only source quoted by APG is a catalog issued by the Australian book dealer Nicholas Pounder in December, 1994, that is some months after the publication of the Picador edition of The Crossing. Additionally, it is worth noting that Rare Book Hub doesn’t list any copies of All the Pretty Horses signed on a bookplate at auction.
In my opinion, the bookplates found in copies of All the Pretty Horses originated from the batch issued later by the publisher for The Crossing and were affixed to them by booksellers or collectors. In reality, a “signed issue” of All the Pretty Horses, as far as we can determine, does not exist.
LATER PRINTINGS: a second printing before publication was issued, consisting in 2.019 copies (Peter Strauss to Howard Woolmer).
NOTABLE COPIES:
- MURRAY COPY: a very good copy, inscribed to Philip Murray: “For Phillip [sic] / All best from your friend / Cormac McCarthy”. Sold at Fonsie Mealy auctioneers in December 2019.
COLLECTING TOPICS: Rare Book Hub lists only one signed or inscribed copy at auction, the Murray copy mentioned above. However, merely signed copies surface in the market from time to time. As of March 2005, two were offered on AbeBooks. Unfortunately, most of those copies feature very disputable signatures, and some are definitely forgeries. I have come across no inscribed copies with rock-solid provenance other than the Cahill copy and the Murray copy. They are very, very scarce in my experience.
Discover more from The MCCARTHYIST
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.