The Orchard Keeper, The Ecco Press edition, second printing
The Ecco Press, New York, 1985.
First The Ecco Press edition, second printing with price of “$ 8.50” on the back panel and a different cover matching the style of those of Outer Dark and Child of God. Summary of the novels and praise of the novel by National Observer, Chicago Tribune Books Today and Cleveland Plain Dealer on the back cover. Softcover, 20,4 x 13,7 cm., 246 numbered pages. Publisher’s green and orange pictorial wrappers with black spine and white back panel, lettered in white and black, by Saksa Art & Design, Inc.
Inscribed on the title page by McCarthy to Dale Walker in blue ballpoint pen: “For Dale / All best wishes / Your Friend / Cormac McCarthy”.
CONDITION: near fine.
Published in Fall, 1985 at $8.50, in an unknown print run.
There are no records about the print run of this second printing either in The Ecco Press papers held at the New York Public Library or in the several letters by McCarthy dating back to the time. Dan Halpern couldn’t recall it. The book first printing was still advertised on Autumn 1984 issue of Antaeus along with the then just published Outer Dark and Child of God. An internal note of The Ecco Press dated July 29, 1985 authorizes the production of “The Orchard Keeper”, so the second printing was put out on Fall of the same year.
RECIPIENT: In spite of the inscription is just “For Dale” the identification with Walker is practically certain: the book was acquired by the collector Paul Ford as part of a little flock including two others The Ecco Press McCarthy titles with alike inscriptions and a first edition of The Crossing inscribed to “Dale Walker”.
Dale Walker was born in Decatur, Illinois, in 1935. He was a writer, author of 23 books. Among them, biographies of Jack London, John Reed and the highly praised “The Boys of ’98: Theodore Roosevelt and the Rough Riders”. He also served as a television reporter, editor, the University of Texas at El Paso director of News-Information Office and university press director for almost 30 years. He was past president of Western Writers of America. He lived in El Paso where met McCarthy. Clay Reynolds, writer and Dale’s friend, on the website of the Texas Institute of Letters, describes him as a “friend and chess opponent to Cormac McCarthy” (“Dale Walker 1935-2015” in https://www.texasinstituteofletters.org/archives/2016-Memorials.pdf ).
Dale praised McCarthy’s work along with that of Melville, he published two articles on Blood Meridian on Southwestern magazines and, in 2008, donated materials on McCarthy to the University of Texas; they includes magazines, various newspaper clippings, photocopies of work and reviews. Walker passed away in 2015.
PROVENANCE: purchased from the American collector Paul Ford in 2021.
COLLECTING TOPICS: signed or inscribed copies of the four McCarthy titles published by The Ecco Press in its “Neglected Books of the Twentieth Century” series are increasingly scarce and sought after. Prices have raised consequently. A signed copy of The Orchard Keeper, second printing, was sold by the English collector Philip Horowitz for roughly $300 on 2011. But as far as April, 2017 Amir Naghib of Captain Ahab’s Rare Books offered in his E-List 20 near fine copies signed in an early hand of The Orchard Keeper in the second printing, Outer Dark, Child of God and an inscribed Blood Meridian in very good condition. All of them sold eventually in a range between $1,200 and 1,300. As far as I know, between July 2023, and January, 2024, no signed or inscribed copies were offered on the market.
Rare Book Hub doesn’t mention any copy at auction
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