Description
Signed first edition of Simple Stakes a Claim by Langston Hughes.
Octavo, 191pp. Cream hardcover, title printed in black and green on spine. The first printing, with the publisher’s “R” logo inside a circle on the copyright page. Solid text block, short split to top edge of front hinge, a near fine example. In the publisher’s dust jacket, price-clipped, wear to edges, sunned spine. A few small chips to top edge of spine reinforced with tape to verso. (Blockson 6380) (Bruccoli & Clark III, 165) Housed in a custom green cloth clamshell, title in gilt over green morocco spine.
Inscribed by Hughes on the front free endpaper: “To Irene- Sincerely, Langston / Feb 16, 1959.”
This is the third book in the Jesse B. Semple series, preceded by Simple Speaks His Mind and Simple Takes a Wife.The recipient of this copy, Irene Liggins, and her husband Alfred were long-standing members of the NAACP. Hughes often visited their house in Cleveland, his high school hometown, when hosting “poetry-to-jazz” evenings at the Karamu House to raise money for the local community center near his alma mater, Central High School.
