About this Item
A later 12th impression of the first UK edition, published in 1948, and translated from the German by Ludwig Lewisoh. The book was first published in the UK by Hamish Hamilton in 1942, and went through a number of reprintings before a cheap edition was published in 1944. This is the fourth impression of the cheap edition, and 12th impression overall. The book was originally published in the German language by Hermann-Fischer Verlag, Stockholm in 1941. ***Very good in blue cloth-covered boards, with gilt titles to the spine and front board. The boards are clean and unmarked, with just light browning to the spine. Head and tail of spine are not creased. Corners sharp. Top edge of the page block sightly darkened. Internally the pages are clean with virtually no foxing. Neat contemporary ownership details to the front free endpaper, but no other annotations. The paper used is very thin [due to post-war restrictions still in force] but there are no creases or tears. Spine tight. ***In the original printed dustwrapper, with an illustration by Roger Furse. The dustwrapper is reasonably complete, but there is some loss at the head of the spine, a small hole in the middle of the spine, and a chip to the top edge of the front panel near the foldover. Some light rubbing, nicks and creases at the extremities. The colour of the front panel of the dustwrapper is bright and unfaded, but the spine is slightly browned. The white back panel is nice and clean. **183mm x 122mm. 424 pages. ***'Franz Viktor Werfel (10 Sept 1890 - 26 Aug 1945) was an Austrian-Bohemian novelist, playwright, and poet whose career spanned World War I, the Interwar period, and World War II. He is primarily known as the author of "The Forty Days of Musa Dagh" (1933, English tr. 1934, 2012), a novel based on events that took place during the Armenian genocide of 1915, and "The Song of Bernadette" (1941), a novel about the life and visions of the French Catholic saint Bernadette Soubirous, which was made into a Hollywood film of the same name. Franz Werfel was a German-speaking Jew born in Prague in 1890. He became well known as a playwright. In the 1930s in Vienna, he began writing popular satirical plays lampooning the Nazi regime until the Anschluss, when the Third Reich under Adolf Hitler annexed Austria in 1938. Werfel and his wife Alma (Gustav Mahler's widow) fled to Paris until the Germans invaded France in 1940. The story of Bernadette Soubirous and Our Lady of Lourdes is told by Werfel with many embellishments, such as the chapter in which Bernadette is invited to board at the home of a rich woman who thinks Bernadette's visionary "lady" might be her deceased daughter. In side-stories and back story, the history of the town of Lourdes, the contemporary political situation in France, and the responses of believers and detractors are delineated. Werfel describes Bernadette as a religious peasant girl who would have preferred to continue on with an ordinary life, but takes the veil as a nun after she is told that because "Heaven chose her", she must choose Heaven. Bernadette's service as a sacristan, artist-embroiderer, and nurse in the convent are depicted, along with her spiritual growth. After her death, her body as well as her life are scrutinized for indications that she is a saint, and at last she is canonized. The novel is laid out in five sections of ten chapters each, in a deliberate nod to the Catholic Rosary. Unusual for a novel, the entire first part, which describes the events on the day that Bernadette first saw the Virgin Mary, is told in the present tense, as if it were happening at the moment.' [Wiki] ***A later impression of the first UK edition, in the original dustwrapper. An uncommon title. ***For all our books, postage is charged at cost, allowing for packaging: any shipping rates indicated on ABE are an average only: we will reduce the P & P charge where appropriate - please contact us for postal rates for heavier books and sets etc. Seller Inventory # 8176
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Bibliographic Details
Title: THE SONG OF BERNADETTE [First UK edition - ...
Publisher: Hamish Hamilton, London
Publication Date: 1948
Binding: Hardcover
Illustrator: Roger Furse [Dustwrapper illustration]
Condition: Very Good
Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good
Edition: First UK Edition
