The First Volume of an Autobiography
INSCRIBED FOR JOHN AND PENELOPE BETJEMAN
A Little Learning The First Volume of an Autobiography
Chapman & Hall, 1964.
First edition. Grey boards lettered in silver, in original dustwrapper. Inscribed by Waugh for John and Penelope Betjeman on the front free endpaper, "For John & Penelope, with love from Evelyn, 10th Sept 1964". With an annotation in Betjeman's hand to p. 192, indicating that Waugh's "friend of my heart" who he calls "Hamish Lennox" is in fact "Alistair Graham". A very good copy in a very good dustwrapper.
An exceptional association copy, uniting two of the most prominent British authors of the twentieth century.
Waugh and Betjeman met at Oxford, and Waugh remained friends and correspondents with him and his wife Penelope. Penelope was very much Waugh's muse when he wrote Helena (1950), and Waugh confided in a 1945 letter to Betjeman, "I am writing her life under the disguise of St Helena's". When Betjeman wrote of his enjoyment of the novel on publication five years later, Waugh replied, "It is you & six or seven others whom I seek to please in writing".
The initial volume of Waugh's autobiography documenting his youth and education. His death two years after this publication meant that his autobiography was never completed.
Stock ID: 42525
£5,000.00
