King, Stephen (1977) ‘The Shining’, US first edition

Stephen King (1977) ‘The Shining’, US first edition, first printing, published by Doubleday. All first issue point present ‘First Edition’ on the copyright page; the ‘R49’ gutter code on page 447 as called for. Dust jacket correctly priced at USD 8.95. One of only 25,000 copies printed which was less that King’s debut ‘Carrie’.

Condition: a beautiful copy essentially in fine condition. We have included 20 pictures so that the buyer can scrutinize the book and dust jacket in detail. The lettering on the spine is not rubbed out and still diplays the vibrant leters in gold. No fraying to the edges of the spine which is still taut like on the day the book was produced. The boards are clean wiith no bumps, no scratches etc. The pag block is clean with no marks whatsoever. Internally no names, no bookplates, no stamps etc. Since the copy was standing on the shelf the page block at the top is sagging a bit which is a natural process rather than a human-caused flaw. The dust jacket is not price clipped and extremely close to like new. There is a minuscule trace of rubbing on ‘Shing’ of the spine upon close inspection, otherwise no tears, no smudges etc. As dust jackets go, a very nice example.

Doubleday’s Stephen King books were notoruiusly of poor quality and it is very hard to find a ‘Shining’ copy in fine condition, even harder than to find a fine copy of ‘Carrie’ which at least was published entirely in cloth and with a higher print run.

‘The Shining’ was adapted by Stanly Kubrick for cinema and is regarded as the best horror film of all time even though King himslef does not approve of the visul translation, so he produced his own TV rendition more recently.