Finlay, Ian Hamilton

The Dancers Inherit the Party

London, England, UK: Fulcrum Press, 1969. First Hardcover Edition. Hardcover. "When I have talked for an hour I feel lousy - | Not so when I have danced for an hour: | The dancers inherit the party | While the talkers wear themselves out and | sit in corners alone, and glower." (title poem, pg. 11). The Dancers Inherit the Party is Scottish poet Ian Hamilton Finlay's (1925-2006) first full collection of poems. The poems are short, comic-melancholy lyrics and it is the last thing he published before turning wholly to concrete poetry. Finlay uses nursery-rhyme meters, one-word-per-line spareness, and a naive-sounding diction that lets melancholy arrive without announcement. The poems are objects more than utterances. Finlay played a leading part in the Concrete Poetry movement but is best known for "Little Sparta," his home in the Pentland Hills of Edinburgh, Scotland, which he transformed into an original modern conception of a classical garden with sculptures and stone inscriptions carefully placed within the landscape. Published by John Montgomery's Fulcrum Press, The Dancers Inherit the Party was presented as a first edition; it wasn't. Gael Turnbull's Migrant Press had issued it previously, and Fulcrum's is actually considered the third edition overall, or the first hardcover edition, though it does add poems not in the Migrant printings. Finlay quarrelled with Fulcrum in 1974, took legal action and won. Montgomery couldn't carry the costs, closed the press, and most remaining stock was destroyed. A sad day for Beat Generation/Black Mountain School acolytes as Fulcrum had published roughly forty books between 1965 & 1974 from twenty-plus poets including Allen Ginsberg's Ankor Wat (See Item No. 5964) Gary Snyder's A Range of Poems (Item No. 9122) & The Back Country (Item No. 8194), alongside Ed Dorn's Gunslinger (Item No. 5822). For more from Finlay please see Item No.s 8502, 9286 & 9288. From the collection of Richard Cupidi (b. 1945), our esteemed mate in the UK who managed the fabled Unicorn Bookshop in Brighton, England for founder Bill Butler (1934-1977, the famed American-expatriate bookseller & publisher). From the late 1960s through the early 1970s, Unicorn proffered & published many outstanding productions by William S. Burroughs (1914-1997), J.G. Ballard (1930-2009) et al., some of which have become the scarcest, all-but-unobtainable Beat-&-Beyond collectibles (see for example our Item No.s 8217 & 8366). After prevailing against censorious harassment efforts, Unicorn closed & Butler died in short order. Cupidi went on to found the Public House Bookshop in Brighton, which had a long & successful run but is also now closed, & he still resides there. We have been honored to obtain what Cupidi has termed "The Last Hurrah," all the remaining gems of Unicorn & Public House, including this standout. Hardcover in unclipped Dust Jacket: First Hardcover Edition, first printing though not explicated as such at copyright page. A most collectible book of poetry in one of its rarest contemporary forms with relevant association & very distinguished provenance. Book in relatively fine-to-very fine condition with very mild age-toning & rubbing mostly to fine edges of front, back covers & spine; mild age-toning to text block; moderate spot-staining to top of same. Interior fine-to-very fine with very mild age-toning mostly to blank margins & fine edges of some page leaves. Dust Jacket fine-to-very fine with mild-to-moderate age-toning, rubbing & spot staining to front, back covers, spine & flaps. Fine-Very Fine / Fine-Very Fine. [Item #9286]

Price: $75.00 save 10% $67.50