The Mailer Review/Volume 3, 2009/Collecting Mailer

Written by
Allen Ahearn

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Abstract: An examination of the dimensions, complications, and rewards of collecting works by Norman Mailer.

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URL: https://prmlr.us/mr03ahe

He was condemned and praised by the critics, and always controversial. You either liked his take on the world and his fiction and essays, or you didn’t. It has been said that good art provokes strong feelings—positive or negative. Well, if that is the measure, I would say that Norman Mailer was definitely a good artist. Others must agree because, in my experience, many book collectors value the first editions of Norman Mailer’s books.

Mailer was a man with a myth that surrounded him, and now, after his death, he has become somewhat of a legend—the tough guy who would take on anyone. Considering his importance in the canon of American literature, collecting first editions of his work seems like a reasonable investment for an admirer of his work (at least that is what we tell ourselves to rationalize buying first editions). I will therefore attempt to explain first edition collecting, outline the collectible Mailer books and how to identify them, and give an estimate of the retail prices in the market for fine copies of his books. It should be noted that the retail prices discussed below are for unsigned copies of his books and that signed copies would be higher priced, depending on the book. His signature would add $40 or $75 to inexpensive common books and hundreds of dollars to scarce books. It is difficult to put a fixed percentage on the increase.

A little background: Norman Mailer obtained an engineering degree from Harvard University in 1943 and attended the Sorbonne in Paris in 1947–48 He served in the Army during World War II, from 1944 to 1946. He was the Co-Editor of Dissent magazine from 1952 to 1963 and a contributing editor thereafter. He was a co-founder and the namer of the Village Voice. Mailer famously ran for mayor of New York City in 1969. He won a Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award for non-fiction with The Armies of the Night in 1969 and a Pulitzer in fiction for The Executioner’s Song in 1980.

Mailer has been a presence on the American literary scene since the 1940s. He was a man of his times, who wrote on or contributed to all the subjects that we, collectively, have been involved in the last seventy years: WWII, movies and plays (commentary and production), race relations, politics, architecture, bullfighting, prize fighting, Kennedy and his assassination, Vietnam, the space program, protests, sex, feminism, cancer, government, literature ~including criticism!, killers, the Bushes, Iraq, God, reincarnation, etc., etc. His was an amazing output, spanning over seven decades.

There is more to be said than the scope of this article allows about the man so many expected would write the “Great American Novel.” He certainly wanted to write a great novel the acclaimed writers who have preceded him would admire and might have read with pleasure. Many believe he did write the “Great American War Novel”—The Naked and the Dead

Now, if you like Mailer, you probably have many of his books in your library. The question is, are you a collector or just an accumulator? Most of the world’s book buyers are accumulators who often have piles of books for which they feel no great attachment, and may not have even read. Book collectors start as readers. This point may seem obvious, but, it is important to keep in mind—the majority of book collectors collect authors or subjects they are currently reading, or have read and enjoyed. In fact, perhaps “enjoyed” is really not descriptive enough. Collectors do not just enjoy these books; they feel an affinity with the author and admire the author as one of the best in the field. The author expresses the collector’s thoughts and inchoate insights in ways the collector would, if he or she had the talent.

Book readers become book collectors when they find that books have become important as objects that they wish to own, admire, and enjoy at their leisure. This is an essential point, for most readers are content with reading a library copy or a paperback reprint and have no desire to go beyond this point. In order to understand the drive of a book collector, one must understand that most people are attracted to book collecting for three reasons, the first of which I have covered above: the love of the book as an object, the true enjoyment or fun of the search, and the economics or investment potential (that they will at least hold their value). From our experience with readers who have made the transition to collectors, all three motivations exist in varying degrees.

My wife, Pat, and I have been around the book trade for over fifty years. We started as collectors in the 1950s, issued a few catalogs every year in the 1960s and early 1970s, and opened the Quill & Brush as a book and art store in 1976. We’ve been selling books full-time ever since. A tribute to fellow bookseller Jim Lorson in the 2008 Fall/Winter issue of the Antiquarian Booksellers’ Association of America Newsletter brilliantly elucidates the evolution from book collector to seller for so many of us. Roger Gozdecki, owner of Anthology Rare Books in California, observed: “Booksellers aren’t born, they are seduced. At some point in life, often middle age, a certain type of bibliophile willingly foregoes a stable long-term relationship with their putatively finite book collection, in order to engage in a seemingly infinite succession of intense and preferably fast affairs with what will henceforth be called ‘inventory.’ ” Somewhat like a mid-life crisis for couples, and we, coincidentally, were in our forties when we opened our first store.

Over the years we have been associated with the book trade, it has gone through many changes. Gone are the huge bookstores in major cities. By the 1970s, when we became more involved in the trade, most of the legendary stores were gone. Locally, for example, Lowdermilks in Washington closed at the end of the 1960s, and there was no successor. In most cases, smaller shops moved into the area, but there was no longer a large central establishment. At present there are large used bookstores, but, with the exception of those who own their buildings—such as the Strand in New York City—most stores are now located outside of large cities. Unfortunately, rents in the cities or even in close-in suburbs are unreasonable for the large space necessary to house the inventory of a general used bookstore.

Over the past three decades, the book trade was slowly evolving, but nothing could have prepared us for the changes in the last ten years. The Internet has drastically and irrevocably changed the way we sell books and the way collectors and other book purchasers buy their books. Although the Internet has been around awhile (we have been on it with a home page since 1995), it was only in 2000 that the number of books on line increased dramatically. Books that previously may have taken years to track down can now be located in an instant using the internet. At the beginning of 1998, Advance Book Exchange (ABE) had 1,500 “dealers” or subscribers on line, listing a cumulative total of approximately 4,000,000 out-of-print books. By the middle of 1999, the numbers were up to 4,500 and 12,000,000, respectively. Now, we believe, they advertise 13,500 subscribers with about 110,000,000 books.

There is no doubt that the availability of so many books has reduced the prices of common books. In the far-off past of 1997, a collector’s or dealer’s book-buying universe was defined by the dealer and auction catalogs received, the stocks in the local stores, and books seen in bookstores on visits to other towns or cities. Now, with so many books on the internet, one can see almost the total availability of titles world-wide

Book prices are set by supply and demand. If the supply goes up drastically, as it has, demand is sated and prices go down. So, if there are two hundred copies in fine condition of a certain first edition, the prices of these books will be priced less than comparable copies ten years ago.

For those interested in collecting Norman Mailer, this change is good, because many of Mailer’s later first editions were printed in relatively large quantities and can be purchased for less than published prices, in some cases. In our list of Mailer titles below, for instance, we may have an estimated retail value of $15 to $75 per book, but copies may be found on eBay or one of the book sites for far less. Of course, you may have to work a little to ensure the seller really has what is advertised.

Before we go much further into technical details, let me reiterate what most of you probably know. A first edition is the first printing of a book. It is true that a first edition may have one or more printings and that a second edition will normally be noted only if there are actual changes, usually major, in the text. But for a collector, a first printing is the only true first edition.

Within the first printing there can be differences that make the earlier books in the printing more valuable than the later books in the same printing. These differences are identified by “points,” such as different dust jackets on The Naked and the Dead, below.

If it is difficult to explain book collecting in general, the reason for collecting first editions is even more difficult to explain to those who are not afflicted with the mania. Bob Wilson, in his book Modern Book Collecting, deals with the question when he comments on book collecting in general:

A great many people over a great many decades, have written pamphlets, whole books even, to justify the collecting of books. This seems to me to be an unnecessary exercise. If you are predisposed to collect books, you don’t need any ex post facto justification for having done so. And on the other hand, if you are not convinced before you start, the chances are that no argument is going to win you over (xiii).

In his book This Book-Collecting Game, A. Edward Newton puts it as well as anyone has:

Book-collecting, it’s a great game. Anybody with ordinary intelligence can play it: there are, indeed, people who think that it

takes no brains at all; their opinion may be ignored. No great amount of money is required, unless one becomes very ambitious. It can be played at home or abroad, alone or in company. It can even be played by correspondence. Everyone playing it can make his own rules—and change them during the progress of the game. It is not considered ‘cricket’ to do this in other games. (34)

With that advice we’ll move on to the list of Mailer’s books. This list is one in our series of Author Price Guides, which are really bibliographical checklists with estimated retail prices. The bulk of the bibliographical information furnished herein was provided by J. Michael Lennon, Norman Mailer’s archivist, authorized biographer and friend, and is used with his permission; he is referred to as “ref[erence] a” below. The printing quantities are estimates furnished by Mailer. We would also like to thank Thomas Fiske and Charles Michaud for their assistance.

In addition to the items listed below there are a number of publicity handouts, position papers and notes to workers that were generated during the NYC mayoral campaign. We have seen these catalogued in the $50 to $100 range. How many of these, if any, were actually written by Mailer is unclear but they would certainly reflect his thoughts and opinions and would presumably have been approved by him.

A few abbreviations are used to denote the publisher’s practice of identifying first printings:

• NVA indicates “no value assigned,” as we think it is rare or unobtainable
• [0] or [ ] indicates we are not sure if the item actually states first edition/

printing as we’ve never had a copy

• [1] indicates the copyright page of the first printing states first printing/

edition or First published . . .

• [2] indicates the book was a limited edition and this fact is stated in the

book

• [3] indicates that the copyright page has a series of numbers beginning

with “1”

• [4] indicates a Random House printing which had “First edition” on

copyright page and the numbers “23 45 6...” (on the second printing they took the “First edition” slug off)

• [5] indicates that the first printing has an “R” in a circle on the copyright

page. This is how Rinehart identified their first editions. They took the “R” off on later printings but never changed the copyright page in any other way

The prices listed below are estimated retail prices based on the copy being in fine condition. The first number is an estimate of the book without the dustwrapper and the second is the book in its dustwrapper. As you can see, the largest value is for copies in dustwrappers, which are the objects that are most subject to wear, as books are normally found to be in very good to fine condition. . . .