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Ozick, Cynthia : The Cannibal Galaxy

Alfred A. Knopf, New York City, NY, 1983

ISBN 039452943X

First Edition / First Printing. Fine in Fine Dust Jacket. 162 pages. The author's second novel. Now considered a late-modern classic. The First Hardcover Edition. Precedes and should not be confused with all other subsequent editions. Published in a small and limited first print run as a hardcover original only. The First Edition is now scarce. Presents Cynthia Ozick's "The Cannibal Galaxy". Published more than seventeen years after her sprawling debut novel, "Trust": A work of condensed brilliance. It deals with a characteristic Ozickian theme: The constant struggle to reach transcendence and if possible, achieve greatness - in one's eyes. The main character, Joseph, is a Jewish Frenchman living in America. He faced many hardships during the first decades of his life. When he is finally able to overcome them and enjoy the blessings of his emancipation, he still cannot let go of his own sense of failure. Now, the very idea of greatness is oppressive to most human beings, who would settle for material success without any second thoughts. Not Ozick and her deeply felt characters. A cult writer once upon a time, Cynthia Ozick is now firmly established as one of our finest writers. It took a very long time for the reading public as well as the critics to realize her greatness. By her own admission, it was a struggle to achieve the recognition she deserved and the belated fame is more "folly" than anything else. She is writing in three literary traditions simultaneously, all of them at the most profound level imaginable: The ancient Jewish, the modern European, and the Jamesian American. Hence, the dazzling allusiveness, poignant beauty, and sheer intensity of her work. Her prose style - imbricated, brachiate, and filigreed, to borrow three of her own favorite words - is a paradox: The rush of metaphors arrives at and realizes a work of luminous beauty. An absolute "must-have" title for Cynthia Ozick collectors. This copy is very prominently, neatly, and beautifully signed in black ink-pen on the title page by Cynthia Ozick. It is signed directly on the page itself, not on a tipped-in page. This title is a late-modern classic. This is one of few such signed copies of the First Hardcover Edition/First Printing still available online and is in especially fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright, a pristine beauty. Please note: Copies available online have serious flaws, are subsequent printings, or are remainder-marked. This is surely an accessible and lovely alternative. A scarce signed copy thus. Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 1996 for "Fame & Folly". Finalist for the National Book Award in 1997 for "The Puttermesser Papers". Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award in 2001 for "Quarrel & Quandary". Recipient of the Lannan Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award in 2000. One of the greatest American writers of the 20th century. A fine copy. (SEE ALSO OTHER CYNTHIA OZICK TITLES IN OUR CATALOG). ISBN 039452943X.

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