Ernest Hemingway

Hemingway's legendary first published book, and among the rarest of his first editions.

• Ernest Hemingway (American).
• [Paris]: (Contact Publishing Co.), (1923).
•  [8], 58, [2] pages.
• Original blue printed wrappers, uncut and partially unopened.
• Housed in custom blue cloth slipcase and chemise.

The typography and design of Hemingway's first book reflected the new Modernist style for which Hemingway would become known: spare, balanced, striking. In this as in his prose, Hemingway was influenced by Gertrude Stein, who advised a careful pick of typeface for the titles listed on the front wrapper, "good and black, but not squatty like the others" (quoted in Grissom, 26).

Three Stories And Ten Poems was issued by Robert McAlmon's formative Modernist press, Contact, one of the original loci of the burgeoning movement. McAlmon also brought out numerous other classic expatriate texts, including Stein's epic monument The Making Of Americans, William Carlos Williams's Spring And Fall, Gertrude Beasley's cult feminist memoir My First Thirty Years, Bryher's pioneering autobiographical lesbian novel Two Selves, and H.D.'s Palimpsest — though it was this Hemingway book that would ultimately become the most famous of all its publications.

Poorly constructed and issued in an edition of only 300 copies, Three Stories And Ten Poems has become one of the most sought rarities of the 20th century and a cornerstone for any collection that documents the rise of Modernism.