More Pricks Than Kicks

1970. First Edition. hardcover. One of one hundred copies, numbered and signed by Samuel Beckett (1906-1989), this is copy number 2, from the library of Édith Fournier, who worked with him on the French translations of his works. Signed and numbered on copyright page, this copy is bound in original white quarter calf over orange cloth, spine and front cover lettered in gilt, all edges gilt. Spine tanned with a tiny scuff, otherwise like new. Housed in the original matching orange cloth slipcase, showing light shelf wear. First published in Britain by Chatto & Windus in 1934, this limited edition was republished by Calder and Boyars in 1970. 'More Pricks Than Kicks' is a collection of ten witty and satirical short stories about an Irish intellectual. The stories chart the life of the book's main character, Belacqua Shuah, from his days as a student to his accidental death. Beckett took the name Belacqua from a figure in Dante's Purgatorio, a Florentine lute-maker famed for his laziness and who had given up on ever reaching heaven. . . . Signed Copy. Books ship from the US and Ireland.…