Our Synthetic Environment

New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1962. First Edition. First printing. Octavo. Tan cloth hardcover; dustjacket; xx,285,20pp (index). Boards slightly toned at edges, red top-stain faded to pink, else a tight, Very Good or better copy. In the original dustwrapper, unclipped (priced $4.95 on front flap); sunned on spine panel, slightly creased and worn; Very Good - a quite presentable copy.

Widely regarded as Bookchin's first book, though it was in fact preceded by a 1953 work in German co-written with Götz Ohly. A prescient examination of wide-scale environmental contaminants, including agricultural chemicals, food additives, and antibiotics. Published (truncated) the same year as (in fact, a few months prior to) Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, Bookchin's Our Synthetic Environment covered much of the same ground without attracting nearly the same degree of popular attention. But the book established Bookchin's bona fides as a deep environmental thinker, and launched a forty-year career over which he became the leading voice on the New Left on environmental matters. Infrequent in commerce, especially without institutional markings, as it appears much of the initial print run went to libraries. (Inventory #: 82186)