A Year at the Sorbonne: A Proustian Life
Council Bluffs, Iowa: The Yellow Barn Press, 2002. First Edition, First Printing.
Small Quarto (9 3/4 x 6 1/2 inches; 247 x 162 mm), xii, [2] 127, [3] pages, in quarter-cloth and patterned boards, paper label to spine, in a patterned slipcase.
One of only 150 copies, this is a biography of Elmo Elton Shaver (1916-1995), a Francophile and popular teacher of foreign languages. Elmo kept diaries documenting his life from tenth grade until just days before his death. Oliver Pollak, a lawyer and professor of history at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, has drawn from Elmo's diaries to paint a vivid picture of his life. We follow him growing up in Long Beach and his 1937 junior year at the Sorbonne in Paris. (That year had a profound influence on Elmo, and he was a frequent visitor during the rest of his life.) We also learn about his embrace of Christian Science, his distaste for the New Deal, his decades of teaching languages at Orange Coast College in California, and his attraction to men.
This book was published by the Yellow Barn Press, founded by Elmo's younger brother, Neil Shaver. Neil designed the book, which is printed in 12-point Monotype Garamond, set by Michael and Winifred Bixler. Sandy Connors created the wood engravings and the pattern for the covers. The paper was bound by the Campbell-Logan Bindery in Minneapolis. Copy 93 of the 150 in the edition.
OCLC shows 16 institutional holdings. A scarce copy of a beautiful fine-press production. Item #194
ISBN: 1882916018
CONDITION: The book and slipcase are both fine.
Price: $150.00