Kerouac, Jack

Two Christmas Stories

n/p: Pacific Red Car, 1993. Limited First Edition Thus. Stapled Wrappers. "It's a Sunday afternoon in New England just three days before Christmas- Ma's making the roast in the kitchen range, also tapioca pudding so when sister Nin comes in from outdoors with the shovel she's been wielding in the blizzard there are cold waves of snowy air mixing with the heat steams of tapioca over the stove and in my mouth I can taste whipped cream cold from the icebox on the hot pudding tonight." (first paragraph, "Home at Christmas," unpaginated) A compilation of two Christmas-related stories by Jack Kerouac, Founding Father of the Beat Generation. The two nostalgic stories, "Not Long Ago Joy Abounded at Christmas" & "Home for Christmas," are respectively elegiac & evocative in the unmistakable Kerouac style, albeit not exemplary of the more usual Beat concerns. Chapbook in stapled wrappers, "Published in a limited edition of 100/ 1993" (back cover) by Pacific Red Car, without place or copyright references & therefore what we determine is a bootleg production. Not found in Ron Anstee's Jack Kerouac: The Bootleg Era bibliography (1994), although therein are references to the stories having been separately published, "Not Long Ago..." in 1972 by Oliphant Press (No. 5, pgs. 4-5) & "Home at Christmas" in 1990 by Insight Publications (No. 51, pg. 21). An extraordinarily rare "Bastard Angel" of a compilation (to channel the great Harold Norse), with distinguished provenance: From the collection of Kevin Ring, publisher of the indispensable Beat Scene magazine & other outstanding productions in the UK (many of which are available here), & our good friend. 'Tis the Season (as of this writing) to obtain & gift this most scarce & unusual Kerouac Holiday collectible. In very fine condition with only mild browning, fading, occasional spotting & short, faint creases mostly at blank marginal/edge areas of front, back covers & stapled spine; a few miniscule bumps at edges & corners of same; very slight browning, occasional spotting to edges of text block. Interior very fine with only tiny bumps at corners of some page leaves, otherwise substantially mint. Very Fine. [Item #5229]

Price: $90.00