Mother Night

New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1966. First Edition. Near Fine/Very Good. First hardcover edition, first printing. Signed by Kurt Vonnegut and warmly inscribed on the front free endpaper: "For my student, Richard Wentz, who was in the top half of his class. Iowa City, May 29, 1967." xii, [8], 202 pp. Bound in publisher's black paper-covered boards over brick red spine cloth lettered in silver and black. Near Fine with tanned spine and edges, dust-soiling and light foxing to upper edge of text block, and light toning to contents. In a Very Good unclipped dust jacket with light soiling and edgewear, creases to flaps, blue pen marks to front panel, and impressions to front panel left by pen over paper. Kurt Vonnegut's two-year tenure at the University of Iowa Writer's Workshop, where he signed this book to Richard Wentz, proved more transformational for himself than for his students. He entered the Workshop as an obscure and uncredentialed writer who had been offered the post after the first choice dropped out, and left on the cusp of fame. Mother Night had been published as a paperback in 1961 with little critical notice, and its reissue as a hardcover in 1966 was a sign that his star was rising. It would be fixed in the firmament with the 1969 publication of Slaughterhouse-Five. (Inventory #: 140947388)