Victory: An Island Tale
Price: $275.00
Hard Cover. London: Methuen and Co., 1915. Very Good.
First English edition, first printing. One of 8000 copies. Publisher's red cloth, with gilt lettering and decoration to the spine. Good or better, with mild soiling to cloth, light toning to spine, a bit of wear to cloth at spine ends and joints, corners lightly worn and nicked, lightly bumped to bottom edge of front board, front hinge cracked, pencil mark to front free endpaper, and light pen marks to rear free endpaper. Overall, a suitable copy. Wise 25. Victory's Axel Heyst, imbued from childhood with a pessimistic view of the human race, wanders the globe and lives an isolated existence. When he meets a woman with a cruel employer, his compassion is roused, and he helps her escape. This leads to a dramatic and fatal showdown between Alex and a trio of villainous men on the island of Samburan. Victory is unique in its use of shifting narrative, with each of its four sections told in a different voice. In a Paris Review interview, American author Joan Didion said, "I have never started a novel-I mean except the first, when I was starting a novel just to start a novel-I've never written one without rereading Victory. It opens up the possibilities of a novel. It makes it seem worth doing." Item #JC056
