First Limited Edition AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY 1925 Theodore Dreiser SIGNED + Historically Important Correspondence

First Limited Edition AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY 1925 Theodore Dreiser SIGNED + Historically Important Correspondence

"An American Tragedy", Theodore Dreiser, New York: Boni & Liveright, 1925. First, limited edition, issued in two volumes. Number 326 of 795 copies signed by Dreiser.

Laid in at half-title is an ALS on Dreiser's letterhead, to an F.H. Schoolcraft of Kansas City:

"Dear Mr. Schoolcraft: I am obliged to [you] first for your very sincere letter with its thoughts about An American Tragedy and next the clipping of Mr. [Sinclair] Lewis's speech which I should never have seen I am sure. It is such letters as this from you which make the long labor of writing the book less painful to recall. I am very, very much obliged to you / Theodore Dreiser." A card from Lorne Bair, ABAA/ILAB enclosed states that:

"Dreiser, never known for effusiveness in his inscriptions, here appears genuinely grateful for his admirer's comments. The reference to Sinclair Lewis is likely to Lewis's celebrated 1926 lecture in a Kansas City church, in which he dared 'the fundamentalist God' to strike him dead within ten minutes if He existed."

Includes original mailing envelope, addressed in Dreiser's hand, also tipped in. Publisher's cloth-backed blue boards, in slipcase.