MODERN LIBRARY SERIES 1925

Fall 1925

General

The Modern Library series was founded in May 1917 by Boni & Liveright, a new publishing firm that was created to publish the Modern Library. The series was conceived by Albert Boni, a twenty-five year old Greenwich Village bookseller and occasional publisher. The Modern Library was founded at a time when the United States was undergoing an intense cultural upheaval. Boni was in the thick of the cultural upheaval. His Washington Square Bookshop was a favorite gathering place for Village artists and intellectuals. He was one of the founders of the Washington Square Players. As publisher of The Glebe, a little magazine edited by Alfred Kreymborg, he was already active in promoting translations of modern European writers—much to the dismay of Kreymborg, who was interested mainly in discovering and nurturing unknown Americans.

In May 1925, less than two years after joining Boni & Liveright as vice-president president, Bennett A. Cerf negotiated an agreement to buy the Modern Library from Horace Liveright. He had dreamed of having his own firm from the time he entered publishing, and Liveright, as usual, needed money. The firm had not had a best seller since 1923, Liveright was losing money in the stock market, he was beginning to moonlight as a Broadway producer, and he wanted a divorce. As part of the separation agreement he had to repay large sums that he had borrowed from his wife and father-in-law. Tom Dardis, Liveright’s latest biographer, indicates that the debts to his wife and father-in-law had been repaid at this point and speculates that his primary reason for selling the Modern Library was “the huge amounts he required to continue producing plays on Broadway” (Dardis, Firebrand: The Life of Horace Liveright, p. 228).

In his unpublished autobiography, written shortly before his death, Liveright indicates that the meeting at which the sale of the Modern Library was agreed to was preceded by several weeks of conversations and meetings with friends and advisers and with Cerf and his advisers (Autobiography, insert y, p. 2. Komroff Papers, Columbia University Library). Cerf recalls the decision as having been proposed and settled on May 19. Liveright, who took Cerf to a farewell luncheon to celebrate Cerf’s departure that evening for his first trip to Europe, complained about financial pressures. Cerf repeated an offer he had made before to buy the Modern Library. This time, instead of brushing him off, Liveright asked what he would pay for it, and they continued to negotiate at the office that afternoon. By the end of the afternoon a deal had been struck (Cerf, At Random, pp. 44–46).

Cerf and Liveright agreed to a selling price of $200,000. Included in that sum was the $25,000 that Cerf had lent Liveright when he joined the firm and an additional $25,000 he lent him subsequently. Cerf was getting the Modern Library for an additional payment of $150,000. The money was due after Cerf’s return from Europe, with Cerf to assume control of the series on August 1st.

That evening Cerf sailed on the Aquitania for his first trip to Europe. That night he wrote in his diary:

And so I’m off for bed after the most eventful day of my life. I bought the Modern Library from Boni & Liveright after a whirlwind conference—a step that will alter my entire career (Cerf, Diary, 20 May 1925, Bennet Cerf Papers, Columbia University Library).

He celebrated his twenty-seventh birthday on his last full day at sea before arriving at Southampton on May 26th.

Many details of the purchase remained to be settled. Cerf’s plans called for Donald S. Klopfer to put up $100,000 and go in with him as equal partner, but Klopfer was not certain at the time Cerf sailed that he would be able to raise the money. The two men had met during the autumn of 1918 at Columbia University, when Cerf was a senior and Klopfer was a freshman. Klopfer transferred to Williams College in the middle of his freshman year, but he and Cerf remained friends. Cerf recalled in his autobiography that after attending a concert at Carnegie Hall they walked “all the way around Central Park – over to Fifth Avenue up to 110th Street, over to Central Park West and down to 59th Street, just talking. And when we finished that walk, we were friends for life” (Cerf, At Random, pp. 24–25).

Klopfer left college after his sophomore year to work for his stepfather, who held a one-sixth interest in United Diamond Works, a diamond cutting and polishing factory in Newark, New Jersey. His stepfather had since died, leaving Klopfer his interest in the closely held firm. The other owners agreed to buy Klopfer’s interest for 80 percent of the book value, giving him the $100,000 he needed (Klopfer, interview with GBN, 5 July 1978), and he had the money by the time Cerf returned from Europe.

That gave Cerf and Klopfer enough money to buy the Modern Library, but they lacked working capital to meet operating expenses. At this point Cerf’s uncle, Herbert Wise, came to their aid, lending them 500 shares of Norfolk and Western railroad stock, which was then selling for about $130 a share. They used the stock as collateral for a $50,000 bank loan. They returned the stock to Wise a hundred shares at a time and were able to pay off the entire loan within two years.

One final hitch came up before the sale of the Modern Library was completed. At the last minute Liveright insisted that Cerf and Klopfer give him a contract as an adviser for five years at five thousand dollars a year. “His advice was the last thing we needed,” Cerf recalled, “but he said if we didn’t agree to it, the deal was off. So we had to give in” (Cerf, At Random, p. 54). Shortly after they took over the series they offered Liveright a lump payment of fifteen thousand dollars to cancel the agreement, and Liveright accepted. So the total cost of the Modern Library came to $215,000.

Ownership of the Modern Library was transferred to Cerf and Klopfer on 1 August 1925. They acquired the name and good will of the series, reprint rights to copyrighted titles included in it, the plates owned by Boni & Liveright, and the stock of books on hand, most of which were unbound. The value of the plates and books was estimated at $75,000 (Columbia Auditors, C.P.A. to Henry Hoyns, Harper and Bros., 22 July 1925).

The new company was incorporated as The Modern Library, Inc., with Cerf as President and Klopfer as Vice-President. Gustave Cerf (Cerf’s father), who worked on a part-time basis until his death in 1941, was listed as Secretary and Treasurer. They were joined by two Boni & Liveright employees: Emanuel Harper, who soon became the firm’s treasurer, and Helen Berlin, who was Cerf and Klopfer’s secretary from 1925 until 1928. The Modern Library, Inc. opened for business in a two-room office on the ninth floor of 71 West 45th Street. Cerf and Klopfer worked at desks facing each other. After moving to larger quarters they continued to share an office and work at facing desks until Klopfer accepted a commission in the Air Force in May 1942. They shared a secretary until Cerf’s death in 1971.

The sale of the Modern Library was announced in the New York Times on 13 July 1925. The following advertisement appeared in Publishers’ Weekly (1 August 1925, p. 423; italics in original):

News!
THE MODERN LIBRARY HAS CHANGED HANDS!
ON AUGUST FIRST, nineteen hundred and twenty-five, a new organization will assume publication and distribution of the MODERN LIBRARY.
Its name will be the MODERN LIBRARY, Incorporated.
Its address will be 71 West 45th Street, New York City.
Its sole endeavor will be the further development and exploitation of a series that has grown in eight years to embrace 110 titles, and to be known wherever English books are read.
The format and general character of THE MODERN LIBRARY books will be absolutely unchanged.
The American bookseller can count on the generous cooperation of an experienced and strongly fortified organization with no general publications over which to concern itself, devoting its entire energies to one project – the growth of the MODERN LIBRARY.

Format

All new titles were published in the standard format, with the binding measuring 6⅝ x 4⅜ in. (168 x 110 mm) and the leaves trimmed to 6½ x 4¼ in. (164 x 107 mm).

The ML’s standard format was enlarged in 1939. The new binding measured 7¼ x 4⅞ in. (182 x 123 mm) with a trim size of 7 x 4¾ in. (177 x 120 mm). In 1969 a taller, slightly slimmer format was introduced with the binding measuring 7½ x 4¾ in. (190 x 120 mm) and a trim size of 7¼ x 4½ in. (182 x 115 mm). All dimensions indicated are approximate.

Most books through 1954 were printed with 16 pages on each side of the sheet and bound in gatherings of 16 leaves (32 pages); by 1956 most books were being printed with 32 pages on each side of the sheet and bound in gatherings of 32 leaves (64 pages).

Boni & Liveright printings

A large portion of the ML stock that Cerf and Klopfer acquired from B&L consisted of folded and sewn sheets with Brodzky endpapers attached to the outer leaves. These were sold in ML, Inc. imitation leather bindings and newly printed ML, Inc. jackets. This hybrid format, with B&L title pages and endpapers and ML, Inc. bindings and jackets, is common for final B&L printings. Bound and jacketed volumes acquired from B&L were sold as they were; a small number of bound B&L titles were provided with newly printed ML, Inc. jackets.

Title page

New titles added to the ML in fall 1925 used the title page design inherited from B&L with torchbearer A1 (designed by Lucian Bernhard) replacing the B&L monk device. The title page is enclosed in double rules with each section (title, author, author of the introduction, device, publisher, and place of publication) separated by a horizontal rule. Most B&L titles that were reprinted between fall 1925 and 1939 continued to use existing title-page plates with the B&L device replaced by torchbearer A1. In general, new title-page plates were made for B&L titles only when the text was reset or augmented with new content.

Binding

Imitation leather in dark green or brown with spine lettering in gold and Bernhard torchbearer in gold on the front panel. The bindings were identical to those used by B&L except for the use of the torchbearer device in place of the B&L device

Endpaper

The Brodzky endpaper inherited from B&L was used on the first printing of Beebe’s Jungle Peace (116) and the earliest ML, Inc. reprints of some B&L titles. Bernhard’s new endpaper incorporating his torchbearer design, printed in light yellowish brown, was used on all subsequent titles and later printings of Jungle Peace.

Jacket

Uniform typographic jacket is patterned after late B&L jackets. The Bernhard torchbearer replaces the B&L device on the spine but does not appear on the front panel. Fall 1925 jackets indicate the title and author in capital letters on a deep reddish orange band near the top of the front panel and the series (“The Modern Library” in upper- and lowercase letters) on a deep reddish orange band near the bottom. The jackets include a complete list of ML titles on the flaps and back panel. Both jacket flaps include the publisher’s name and address: the Modern Library, Inc., 71 West 45th St., New York. Some fall 1925 jackets have the statement “New title added monthly” at the bottom of the front flap instead of the publisher’s name and address.

Price

95 cents.

Dating key

(Fall) Dumas, Camille xAnderson, Poor White.

Titles sought, suggested, declined

Theodore Dreiser was one of the first authors Cerf contacted after buying the ML. Cerf expressed the hope that Free and Other Stories (106) would remain in the series for many years to come and that Dreiser would allow the ML to include one of his novels “on a basis that I am sure could be made satisfactory to both of us” (Cerf to Dreiser, 25 July 1925). Twelve Men (159) was added in 1928 and Sister Carrie (230) followed in 1932. An American Tragedy (G89), which B&L published in fall 1925 shortly after Cerf and Klopfer took over the ML, was reprinted as a ML Giant in 1956.

Willa Cather and Edna St. Vincent Millay were among the first authors that Cerf tried to secure for the ML. He wanted Cather’s Song of the Lark and a volume of plays by Millay, but the original publishers declined to grant reprint rights. The Song of the Lark sold too well for Houghton Mifflin to consider a ML edition (Robert N. Linscott, Houghton Mifflin, to Cerf, 4 September 1925). Cerf offered Appleton a five-year reprint contract with royalties of 8 cents a copy for Millay’s plays “Two Slatterns and a King,” “Aria da Capo,” and “The Lamp and the Bell,” indicating that he wanted to use Appleton plates for a first ML printing of 3,000 copies. Millay’s publisher flatly rejected the offer (John W. Hiltman, Appleton & Co., to Cerf, 14 October 1925).

After meeting Walter de la Mare during his trip to England in the summer of 1925, Cerf wrote to enlist his support for a ML edition of one of his works: “I am particularly anxious to have a Walter de La [sic] Mare title in the library and am writing direct to you because before I proceed to interview any of the American publishers who hold the copyright to your works, I would like to hear from you which one of your books, in your opinion, would fit best in the series” (Cerf to de la Mare, 16 October 1925). De la Mare replied that the decision must be left to his American publishers but indicated that he had asked his agent, James B. Pinker, to take up the matter with them (de la Mare to Cerf, 19 November 1925). Several weeks later Pinker told Cerf that none of de la Mare’s American publishers were willing to authorize a reprint edition (James B. Pinker & Sons to Cerf, 14 December 1925).

Cerf contacted H. L. Mencken in 1926 about adding his Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche to the series, but Mencken replied that it was outmoded and in need of revision (Cerf to Mencken, 14 December 1925; Mencken to Cerf, 22 December 1925). Originally published in 1908, Mencken’s study was the first book on Nietzsche in English (Hobson, Fred. Mencken: A Life, p. 89). It has been widely reprinted since it entered the public domain, including several reprint editions in the first decade of the twenty-first century.

The New York publisher Charles Renard offered to sell the ML its plates for J. M. Barrie’s The Little Minister. Cerf replied that the ML would “have no possible use for the plates . . . for some time to come” but offered $50 for them (Charles Renard Co. to Cerf, 18 November 1925; Cerf to Renard Co., 30 November 1925). He later increased the offer to $200, but this appears to have been much less than Renard wanted.

Discontinued

Blasco Ibáñez, The Cabin (1920) 73
Stephens, Mary, Mary (1917) 26

Only a few hundred copies of Mary, Mary (26) and The Cabin (73) remained in the B&L warehouse when Cerf and Klopfer took over the series. They promptly discontinued them and reassigned their catalogue numbers, ML 30 and 69, to Beebe, Jungle Peace and Dumas, Camille, the first new titles added in fall 1925.

116

WILLIAM BEEBE. JUNGLE PEACE. 1925–1940. (ML 30)

116. First printing (1925)

[within double rules] JUNGLE PEACE | [rule] | BY | WILLIAM BEEBE | [rule] | Foreword by | THEODORE ROOSEVELT | [rule] | [torchbearer A1] | [rule] | THE MODERN LIBRARY | [rule] | PUBLISHERS :: :: NEW YORK

Pp. [2], [i–iv] v–xi [xii–xiv], [1–2] 3–297 [298–300]. [1–9]¹⁶ [10]¹⁴

[1] half title; [2] pub. note D3; [i] title; [ii] Copyright, 1918, By | HENRY HOLT & CO. | [short rule] | First Modern Library Edition | 1925; [iii] dedication; [iv] NOTE; v–xi FOREWORD signed p. xi: THEODORE ROOSEVELT.; [xii] blank; [xiii] CONTENTS; [xiv] blank; [1] fly title; [2] blank; 3–293 text; [294] blank; 295–297 INDEX; [298–300] blank.

Format: The first printing has the Brodzky endpaper; the second printing (December 1925) has the Bernhard endpaper.

Variant A: Pp. [2], [i–iv] v–xi [xii–xiv], [1–2] 3–297 [298–304]. [1–10]¹⁶. Contents as 116 except: [2] pub. note A4; [298] blank; [299–304] ML list. (Fall 1925) Note: The second printing retains the copyright and First statements on p. [ii]. The fourth printing (September 1927) omits both and only has a manufacturing statement on p. [ii].

Variant B: Pagination and collation as variant A. Contents as variant A except: [2] pub. note A6; [ii] Copyright, 1920, by | HENRY HOLT & CO. | [short double rule]; [299–302] ML list; [303–304] blank. (Fall 1928) Note: The reason for the 1920 copyright date is unclear. It may have been a printer’s error, like the omission of the copyright date altogether from the 1927 printing.

Jacket A: Uniform typographic jacket B1.

Text on front:
“Mr. Beebe’s volume is one of the rare books which represent a positive addition to the sum total of genuine literature. It is not merely a ‘book of the season’ or ‘book of the year’; it will stand on the shelves of cultivated people, of people whose taste in reading is both wide and good, as long as men and women appreciate charm of form in the writings of men who also combine love of daring adventure with the power to observe and vividly to record the things of strange interest which they have seen. . . . If I had space I would like to give an abstract of the whole book. As it is I merely advise all who love good books, very good books, at once to get this book of Mr. Beebe’s.” THEODORE ROOSEVELT (Fall 1925)

Jacket B: Uniform typographic jacket D. (Spring 1929)

Front flap:
As a trained scientific observer, William Beebe has conducted many expeditions at sea and into the jungle. The wealth of data collected by him and the vivid tales of adventure he has brought back constitute a record unique among books of exploration. In Jungle Peace he describes a remote and glamorous segment of the world —Guiana — and creates a picture of tropical splendor and mystery. He tells of birds and beasts, plants and insects with the accuracy of the scientist and the wonder of a born story-teller. (Spring 1934)

Originally published by Henry Holt & Co., 1918. ML edition (pp. [iii]–297) printed from Holt plates with illustrations and list of illustrations omitted. Published 25 September 1925. WR 3 October 1925. First printing: 5,000 copies. Discontinued 1 January 1941.

Roosevelt’s foreword originally appeared as a front-page review in the New York Times Review of Books (13 October 1918) and was added as a foreword to later Holt printings.

There were at least eleven ML printings between fall 1925 and August 1937 totaling 21,000 copies, including a second printing of 2,000 copies in December 1925. Jungle Peace sold 1,706 copies during the first half of 1928, placing it fifty-sixth out of 147 ML titles.

117

ALEXANDRE DUMAS, fils. CAMILLE. 1925–1970. (ML 69)

117a. First printing (1925)

[within double rules] CAMILLE | [rule] | BY | ALEXANDRE DUMAS, FILS | [rule] | Introduction by | EDMUND GOSSE | [rule] | [torchbearer A1] | [rule] | THE MODERN LIBRARY | [rule] | PUBLISHERS :: :: NEW YORK

Pp. [i–iv] v–xv [xvi], [2], 1–270. [1–9]¹⁶

[i] half title; [ii] pub. note D4; [iii] title; [iv] Edmund Gosse’s Introduction | Printed by Permission of D. Appleton & Co. | [short rule] | First Modern Library Edition | 1925; v–xii INTRODUCTION signed p. xii: Edmund Gosse.; xiii–xv BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE signed p. xv: E. G.; [xvi] blank; [1] fly title; [2] blank; 1–270 text. Note: Most later printings have a manufacturing statement only on p. [iv].

Jacket A: Uniform typographic jacket B1.

Text on front:
Written by Dumas when he was twenty-five, CAMILLE remains in its combination of freshness and form and of the feeling of the springtime of life, a singular, an astonishing piece of work. The novel and the play have been blown about the world at a fearful rate, but the story has never lost its happy juvenility, a charm that nothing can vulgarize. It is all champagne and tears - fresh perversity, fresh credulity, fresh passion, fresh pain. We have seen the play both well done and ill done – in strange places, in barbarous tongues. But nothing makes any difference – it carries with it an April air: some tender young man and some coughing young woman have only to speak the lines to give it a great place among the love-stories of the world. HENRY JAMES (Spring 1928)

Jacket B: Uniform typographic jacket D. Text on front abridged from Henry James quotation on jacket A: “A novel and play that have been blown about the world—but nothing can alter it. It is all champagne and tears—fresh passion, fresh pain—one of the great love stories of the world.” Henry James (Fall 1930)

Front flap:
New generations of readers respond as their parents and grandparents did with unashamed tears to the sad plight of the beautiful and doomed Marguerite Gautier. Camille retains its fragrance through the years; it is a tale that stirs an unassuageable heartache, and over it there hovers a sentiment forever tender and yearning. It is read now as it was before and as it will be read years hence as the love story of the eternal Magdalene glorified by her passion and misfortune. (Spring 1934)

Jacket C: Pictorial in strong yellowish pink (26), pale blue (185) and black on coated cream paper depicting a woman seated in an open coach driven by a bearded coachman; title in strong yellowish pink with three-dimensional shading in black, other lettering in black. Signed: Galdone. Front flap as jacket B. (Spring 1939)

Translation originally published in U.S. as The Lady of the Camellias in the French Classical Romances series (D. Appleton & Co., 1902). The source of the plates has not been identified; the ML edition may have been printed from plates made from a new typesetting. Published 25 October 1925. WR 14 November 1925. First printing: Not ascertained. Discontinued 1970.

Gosse was editor-in-chief of the French Classical Romances series. His introduction and biographical note are taken from the Appleton edition, where the ML introduction constitutes the last third (pp. xxiii–xxxii) of his longer critical essay, “The Novels of Alexandre Dumas the Younger.” The ML paid Appleton a permissions fee of $25 for their use. The translation appears to have been in the public domain.

Camille sold 2,340 copies during the first half of 1928, placing it thirty-sixth among 147 ML titles. It ranked in the fourth quarter of ML sales during the eighteen-month period May 1942–October 1943.

117b. Title page reset (c. 1940)

CAMILLE | BY | ALEXANDRE DUMAS, FILS | Introduction by EDMUND GOSSE | [torchbearer D1 at right; 3-line imprint at left] THE | MODERN LIBRARY | NEW YORK | [rule]

Pagination and collation as 117a.

Contents as 117a except: [ii] blank; [iv] publication and manufacturing statements.

Jacket: Enlarged version of 117a jacket 3. (Fall 1943)

Front flap reset with last sentence revised: “It is read now as it was in the late nineteenth century and as it will be read years hence . . .” (Fall 1955)

118

W. S. GILBERT. H.M.S. PINAFORE AND OTHER PLAYS. 1925–1937. (ML 113)

118a. First printing (1925)

[within double rules] H.M.S. PINAFORE | AND OTHER PLAYS | [rule] | BY W. S. GILBERT | [rule] | INTRODUCTION BY GILBERT GABRIEL | [rule] | [torchbearer A1] | [rule] | THE MODERN LIBRARY | [rule] | PUBLISHERS :: :: NEW YORK

Pp. [i–vi] vii–xvi, [1–2] 3–218 [219–220]. [1–7]¹⁶ [8]⁶

[i] half title; [ii] pub. note D4; [iii] title; [iv] Introduction Copyright, 1925, by | The Modern Library, Inc. | [short rule] | First Modern Library Edition | November, 1925; [v] CONTENTS; [vi] blank; vii–xvi INTRODUCTION signed p. xvi: Gilbert W. Gabriel. | New York, October, 1925.; [1] part title: H.M.S. PINAFORE | or, The Lass That Loved a Sailor; [2] DRAMATIS PERSONÆ; 3–218 text; [219–220] blank.

Contents: H.M.S. Pinafore – Patience – The Yeomen of the Guard – Ruddigore.

Jacket 1a: Uniform typographic jacket B1 with “GILBERT GABRIEL” (without middle initial) listed as the author of the introduction.

Text on front:
If the band of genial and optimistic dramatic critics who have been hailing every twenty-two year old lyricist who negotiates a rhyme with more than one syllable in it as “another Gilbert come to town” ever sees this volume, they’ll simply lock themselves in their room! For a rereading of PINAFORE, PATIENCE, THE YEOMEN OF THE GUARD and RUDDIGORE, all of them contained in this one volume, will convince them anew that there is only one Gilbert, and that, futhermore [sic], his myriad of imitators fade into utter nothingness beside the brilliance and undying sparkle of his famous songs and ballads.
Another Modern Library volume (number 26) contains THE MIKADO, THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE, IOLANTHE, and THE GONDOLIERS. The two volumes belong in the library of every dramatic critic, musical comedy author, and tired business man in America. (Fall 1925)

Original ML collection. Published 25 November 1925. WR 19 December 1925. First printing: Not ascertained. Discontinued 1 January 1938, nearly two years after The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan (G23) was published as a ML Giant.

Gabriel complained that his middle initial had been omitted from the title page and jacket and was assured that it would be included in future printings.

H.M.S. Pinafore and Other Plays is not listed among the ML’s 99 best-selling titles during the first six months of 1928; Gilbert’s The Mikado and Other Plays (29) ranked fifty-sixth.

118b. Title page reset (1925)

Title page completely reset; transcription as 118a except line 6: INTRODUCTION BY GILBERT W. GABRIEL

Pp. [i–vi] vii–xvi, [1–2] 3–218 [219–224]. [1–7]¹⁶ [8]⁸

Contents as 118a except: [ii] pub. note A4; [219–224] ML list. (Fall 1925) Note: The copyright and First statements are retained on p. [iv] of the first printing of 118b; printings examined with 1927 and later lists have only the manufacturing statement on p. [iv].

Jacket A: Uniform typographic jacket B1 with “GILBERT W. GABRIEL” (including middle initial) listed as the author of the introduction. Text on front as 118a, including the misspelling “futhermore” (Spring 1927) Note: There may have been an earlier printing of the jacket with Gabriel’s middle initial.

Jacket B: Uniform typographic jacket D. (Fall 1930)

Front flap:
If you are a Gilbert and Sullivan enthusiast (and who is not?), here, for your constant delight, are four W. S. Gilbert librettos—those merry, spoofing plays to which you have sung and whistled Sir Arthur Sullivan’s inspired tunes. All the sprightliness, the gay satire and the felicity of rhyme are yours for the reading! This is one of the two volumes of W. S. Gilbert’s plays in the Modern Library; the other (No. 26) contains The Mikado, The Gondoliers, The Pirates Penzance and Iolanthe. (Fall 1933)

There was a spring 1939 printing of jacket 2 after H.M.S. Pinafore and Other Plays was discontinued. The spring 1939 jackets were stamped “DISCONTINUED TITLE” and were used on copies sold as remainders.

Also in the Modern Library
Gilbert, Mikado and Other Plays (1918–1938) 29
Gilbert and Sullivan, Complete Plays (Giant, 1936–1971) G23

119

WILLIAM JAMES. THE PHILOSOPHY OF WILLIAM JAMES. 1925–1969. (ML 114)

119a. First printing (1925)

[within double rules] THE PHILOSOPHY OF | WILLIAM JAMES | Drawn from His Own Works | [rule] | WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY | HORACE M. KALLEN | OF THE NEW SCHOOL FOR SOCIAL RESEARCH | [rule] | [torchbearer A1] | [rule] | THE MODERN LIBRARY | [rule] | PUBLISHERS :: :: NEW YORK

Pp. [i–iv] v–vii [viii–x], 1–375 [376]. [1–10]¹⁶ [11]¹⁶(16+1) [12]¹⁶

[i] half title; [ii] pub. note D4; [iii] title; [iv] Copyright, 1925, by | The Modern Library, Inc. | [short rule] | First Edition | December, 1925; v–vii PREFACE signed p. vii: H. M. Kallen.; [viii] blank; [ix] CONTENTS; [x] blank; 1–55 INTRODUCTION | THE MEANING OF WILLIAM JAMES FOR | “US MODERNS” signed p. 55: Horace M. Kallen.; [56] blank; 57–368 text; 369–370 APPENDIX I | DATES AND FAMILY NAMES; 371–375 APPENDIX II | THE WORKS OF WILLIAM JAMES; [376] blank.

Variant A: Pp. [i–iv] v–vii [viii–x], 1–375 [376–378]. [1–11]¹⁶ [12]¹⁸. Contents as 119a except: [ii] pub. note D5; [376–378] blank; First statement omitted. Note: A later printing with the same pagination but the collation [1–11]¹⁶ [12]¹⁶(16+1.2) has only the manufacturing statement on p. [iv].

Variant B: Pp. [i–iv] v–vii [viii–x], 1–375 [376–382]. [1–12]¹⁶ [13]⁴. Contents as 119a except: [ii] pub. note A6; [iv] manufacturing statement; [377–382] ML list. (Spring 1935)

Variant C: Pp. [i–iv] v–vii [viii–x], 1–375 [376–390]. [1–12]¹⁶ [13]⁸. Contents as variant B except: [377–381] ML list; [382–383] ML Giants list; [384–390] blank. (Spring 1939)

Contents: Philosophy and the Philosopher – The World We Live In – The Self – How We Know – The Powers and Limitations of Science – The Realities of Religion – The Individual and Society – Education – The American Scene – Death and the Value of Life. Note: Kallen organized selections from James’s works into chapters with these titles.

Jacket A: Uniform typographic jacket B1.

Text on front:
What William James thinks about man, and the world, and man’s place in it, he has said in many books and many scattered papers. These do not present a complete system of philosophy, but rather special and intensive studies of problems Mr. James felt to be momentous and living at the time. The systematic statement of his position which he aimed at in “Some Problems of Philosophy” was denied him; he died before the book was half done. The selections which make up this book have been chosen with the view of presenting the philosophy of William James systematically in his own words and in the convenient compass, with some approximation to that rounded wholeness he himself would have given it had he lived to complete his work. (Fall 1925)

Jacket B: Uniform typographic jacket D. (Spring 1929)

Jacket C: Uniform philosophy jacket in moderate green (145) and black on cream paper. Signed: WC.

Front flap:
The world recognizes that William James stands pre-eminent among the philosophers of America. His writings have had an influence that has reached beyond the borders of philosophy and into the realms of the social sciences, psychology and religion. In this volume the essence of his contributions to the thought of our day is concentrated. Always the lucid writer and the profound thinker, his good sense and forthright style clear away pretences and obscurities of thought. His is a philosophy that reconciles man to the stream of existence. (Fall 1934)

Original ML collection. Published December 1925. WR 19 December 1925. First printing: Not ascertained. Discontinued 1969/70.

Kallen received royalties of 10 cents a copy for his editorial work on The Philosophy of William James. His royalties during the first six months of 1926 totaled $179.40. The ML probably paid flat permissions fees to James’s original publishers. A few days after The Philosophy of William James was published Cerf invited Kallen to edit a similar volume devoted to Bertrand Russell, but Kallen appears to have declined. The ML published Selected Papers of Bertrand Russell (147) in October 1927. The volume credits Russell as editor but most of the editorial work appears to have been done by Manuel Komroff. In November 1926 Kallen proposed a companion volume devoted to George Santayana. Cerf was interested and initially told Kallen to go ahead, but he canceled the project three months later, fearing that Charles Scribner’s Sons, which published most of Santayana’s works, would not grant the necessary permissions. Ten years later Scribner’s published its own collection, The Philosophy of Santayana, which was reprinted in the ML in 1942 (see 355).

Sales of The Philosophy of William James during the first six months of 1928 placed it 58th out of 147 ML titles. During the 18-month period May 1942‑October 1943 it was low in the second quarter of ML sales.

119b. Title page reset (c. 1941)

THE PHILOSOPHY | OF | WILLIAM JAMES | Selected from His Chief Works | WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY | HORACE M. KALLEN | OF THE NEW SCHOOL | FOR SOCIAL RESEARCH | [torchbearer D4] | [rule] | THE MODERN LIBRARY · NEW YORK | [rule]

Pp. [i–iv] v–vii [viii–x], 1–375 [376–390]. [1–12]¹⁶ [13]⁸

Contents as 119a except: [ii] blank; [iv] publication and manufacturing statements; [377–382] ML list; [383–384] ML Giants list; [385–390] blank. (Spring 1944; fall 1948)

Variant A: Pp. [i–iv] v–vii [viii–x], 1–375 [376–382]. [1–12]¹⁶ [13]⁴. Contents as 119b except: [377–382] ML list. (Spring 1947)

Variant B: Pagination as 119b. [1]¹⁶ [2–5]³² [6]⁸ [7]³² [8]¹⁶. Contents as 119b except: [iv] COPYRIGHT, 1925, BY THE MODERN LIBRARY, INC. | COPYRIGHT RENEWED, 1953, BY HORACE M. KALLEN (Fall 1957)

Jacket: Non-pictorial in dark reddish brown (44) and dark blue (183) on tan paper with title in reverse on inset dark reddish brown panel bordered in dark blue, other lettering in dark blue below pane; designed by Joseph Blumenthal.

Front flap as 119a jacket 3. (Spring 1942)

Also in the Modern Library
James, Varieties of Religious Experience (1936–1969) 296
James, Writings of William James (Giant, 1968– ) G111