[TWAIN, MARK]. Life on the Mississippi. Boston: James R. Osgood and Company, 1883.
FIRST U.S. EDITION, FIRST STATE, with the image of Mark Twain in flames on p. 441 and with "The St. Charles Hotel" caption on p. 443 (with no established priority between "The St. Charles Hotel" and "St. Louis Hotel"). Leather-bound; hardcover in custom box; octavo (22.5 x 14 x 5.5 cm); pp. 624. English text. Stunningly rebound by the noted bookbinder Jan Sobota (his name blind stamped on the lower rear board), in full marbled calf, the upper panelled board with a circular vignette of a paddle steamer echoing the frontispiece and title illustrations. Marbled page edges. Suede endpapers. Profusely illustrated with 316 engravings by various artists. Presented in a custom box designed as a cargo crate and with a suede inner lining. Condition: FINE. An immaculate copy. Scarce thus.
Notes: An exquisitely bound copy of the first U.S. edition, with the important first issue point with the illustration of Mark Twain's head in flames on p. 441 (this drawing was removed in later printings at the specific request of Twain's wife, who found it morbid). The other point of "The St. Charles Hotel" or "St. Louis Hotel" on p. 443 has no established priority. One of the author's best books, this autobiographical account of life on and around America's great river was considered by Twain to be his masterpiece. Life on the Mississippi was written concurrently with Huckleberry Finn and they share several themes. "The material offered by observations on the journey is various beyond enumeration, and much of it is extremely amusing. Hoaxes and exaggerations palmed off by pilots and other natives along the way upon supposed ignorant strangers; stories of gamblers and obsolete robbers; glimpses of character and manners; descriptions of scenery and places; statistics of trade; Indian legends; extracts from the comments of foreign travellers, - all these occur, interspersed with two or three stories of either humorous or tragic import, or of both together" (The Atlantic Monthly, September 1883). Jan Sobota (1939 - 2012) was a highly regarded Czech-Swiss fine bookbinder, known for his often playful sculptural bindings that transform the book into a three-dimensional work of art. Examples of his work rarely appear on the market.
