PERU

New York City, NY: E. P. Dutton, 1986. First Edition. First Printing.. Hardcover. Fine/Fine Dust Jacket.. New York City, NY: E. P. Dutton, 1986. Hardcover. Fine/Fine. First Edition/First Printing. 222 pages. The author's second novel. Gordon Lish's finest achievement. The First Hardcover Edition. Precedes and should not be confused with all other subsequent editions. Published in a small and limited first print run as a hardcover original only. The First Edition is now scarce. Publisher's "Autographed Copy" bold gold sticker pasted in front. Presents Gordon Lish's "Peru". His breakthrough: Ambitious, disruptive, and fully realized. It was critically acclaimed by fellow novelists and literary critics, four of whom, all now iconic figures, contributed blurbs on the Back DJ: Ann Tyler, Stanley Kunitz, Harold Bloom, and Don DeLillo. Lish delves into the psychotic mind. He plunges us headlong into the mind of the protagonist, Gordon, named after the author - his way of implicating rather distancing himself -, a man living in Manhattan's Upper East Side apartment with his wife and son, which the author was at the time (Atticus Lish, the son, is now himself a celebrated and brilliant writer) . An atrocity, flashed across his television screen, precipitates his psychosis. The woman on the night crew assures him that it was only footage of a typical prison disturbance in Peru, mere broadcast-journalism fodder. Nevertheless, Gordon's schizophrenic derangement - vividly reminiscent of the repetitive, closed-off writings of Antonin Artaud, who was genuinely psychotic, whether a conscious nod on the author's part or not - sends him flashing back to his childhood in Long Island, when he killed another boy, which may or may have not occurred, the maddening ambiguity being the whole point. As such, the novel cannot - must NOT - be judged from the rational/moral point-of-view of traditional literature and criticism. Meanwhile, Lish captures the psychotic state of mind with irrefutable accuracy: "I killed Steven Adinoff in Andy Lieblich's sandbox. My God, just to be able to concentrate on something the way you could do it when you were six just to be able to put all your mind into it and all your whole body just to be able to do that with anything again just for one single solitary instant" (Gordon Lish) . "An achievement, one that is poignantly American and yet representative of profound and widespread nostalgias. A voice like none other" (Harold Bloom) . "Hypnotic, entrapping, masterfully designed" (Don DeLillo) . "An absolute original" (Ann Tyler) . An absolute "must-have" title for Gordon Lish collectors. This Autographed Copy is very boldly and beautifully signed, dated (before publication) , and placed in black ink-pen on the front free endpaper by the author: "Gordon Lish 21 December 1985 Books & Co. ". It is signed directly on the page itself, not on a tipped-in page. The author, through his publisher, held a rare pre-publication event at the legendary New York City bookstore. This title is a great book. This is the only such signed, pre-publication dated, and placed copy of the First Hardcover Edition/First Printing available online and is in especially fine condition: Clean, crisp, and bright. A rare signed copy thus. One of the most influential and important writers of the 20th century. A fine collectible copy. (SEE ALSO OTHER GORDON LISH TITLES IN OUR CATALOG). ISBN 0525243755.