George Silverman's Explanation
California State University Northridge Libraries: Santa Susana Press, 1984. Limited Edition. Small Quarto. Item #024140
From the library of Joseph D'Ambrosio. 44(1) pp. Vignette title page, an introduction by Harry Stone and published in honor of the 25th anniversary of California State University, Northridge (1958-1983). Limited to 300 copies. The present copy is #122 signed by both Harry Stone and Irving Block. This is a remarkable and perplexing work. This piece of short fiction, which first appeared in the Atlantic Monthly in 1868, near the end of Dicken's career, differs strikingly from the loosely knit, happily ended novels like Pickwick Papers and Oliver Twist with which Dickens achieved his early reputation. Its neurotic, insecure first-person narrator seems less like Esther Summerson, Pip and David Copperfield than like Dostoevsky's underground man and Eliot's J. Alfred Prufrock. Through the narrative technique of this work "Dickens . . . reveals his bleakest view regarding self-extrication from guilt, because he seems to say that once the prosecutor has moved wholly within the accused's mind, there may be no possible extrication. A fine copy bound in blue cloth centrally stamped and lettered in gilt, spine lettering gilt. [Deborah A. Thomas].
Price: $150.00