Description
The first edition, first issue of the English translation of Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse, published in 1951 by New Directions. Translated from the German by Hilda Rosner.
Small octavo, [4], 153pp, [3]. Green cloth spine, mustard cloth-covered boards, photographic image printed on front cover. Top edge stained green. Bookplate on the front pastedown. Housed in the publisher’s matching pictorial cloth slipcase with mounted publisher’s label. This is the first issue, with no photographer credit on the copyright page, “printed at Vail-Ballou Press” on the copyright page, and the photograph printed only on the front panel of the slipcase. This New Directions edition was the first English-language edition, preceding the later 1951 trade edition and the 1964 gift edition.
(Harrison, Newth & Candido, 31) (Garland 834)
A fine example, appears unread.
Originally published in German in 1922, Hesse’s novel follows the spiritual journey of Siddhartha, a young Brahmin, through asceticism, worldly life, renunciation, and self-discovery.
