The first woman to win the Booker Prize.
RUBENS, Bernice ~ Set on Edge. Signed by the author.
FIRST UK PRINTING. Eyre & Spottiswoode, London: 1960.
8vo., navy boards with silver label lettering to spine and publisher's 'E & S' device to foot; in the red, black, blue and white dustwrapper (unclipped, 16s net) featuring a design by Anne Hickmott; THE BOOK with a couple of pencil markings now erased from endpapers, faintly offset with a couple of very small spots to the fore-edge; else a near-fine copy in the very good DUSTWRAPPER which has some toning to the edges and a couple of tiny nicks; one small chip at head of spine; a few minor patches of darkening. The wrapper is protected in a removable Brodart archival cover. First UK edition, first printing. Boldly signed by the author in blue biro to the title page. The author's debut novel. The story of a Jewish family - the Sperbers - and in particular Gladys, the eldest daughter, who does not find a husband until the age of sixty. Herself the third daughter in a family of four, Rubens was raised Jewish, and stood apart from her musical family to instead pursue a career in writing. This, her first novel, is set over the period of two world wars, and explores familial relationships, and in particular the dynamic between the protagonist and her overbearing mother. Ten years later, in 1970, Rubens would become the first woman to win the Booker Prize for her novel 'The Elected Member'. She remains the only Welsh author to have done so. Scarce.
BINDING: Hardcover
CONDITION: Near Fine
JACKET: Very Good
£225