RAWLINGS SOUTH MOON UNDER 1933 + CROSS CREEK 1942 SCRIBNERS LOT 2 HC DJ FLORIDA For Sale

Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings - South Moon Under & Cross Creek - Shelfwright Shelfwright - Commonwealth of Virginia Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings — Two Books from Cross Creek South Moon Under (1933) · Cross Creek (1942) Charles Scribner's Sons - Both with Dust Jackets Two-Book Lot South Moon Under: Later Printing, Priced Jacket Both with Dust Jackets Cross Creek: Book Club Edition

Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings bought seventy-two acres of orange grove at Cross Creek, Florida in 1928, left a comfortable life behind to do it, and spent the next quarter century writing about the people who lived in the scrub. These two books bracket that work. South Moon Under (1933) was her first novel, the story of Lant, who runs moonshine in the Big Scrub because there is no other way to keep himself and his mother fed; Rawlings went and lived with a moonshiner near Ocala for several weeks before writing it. It was a Book-of-the-Month Club selection and a Pulitzer finalist. Cross Creek (1942) is the memoir, her account of thirteen years in the hamlet itself, decorated by Edward Shenton, who also illustrated The Yearling.

Neither copy is a first printing, and the two are not the same kind of thing, so both are described exactly. The South Moon Under copy carries a printed price on the jacket and does not carry the Scribner "A" on the copyright page, which makes it a later trade printing rather than either a first or a club edition; the Book-of-the-Month Club line on the jacket is advertising for the book's selection, not an edition statement. The Cross Creek copy states Book Club Edition on the front flap, so there is no ambiguity there at all. Rawlings' Scribner club editions of this period are printed from the same plates in the same size on the same paper as the trade issue, which is why the two are so often confused in both directions.

Worth Knowing

Rawlings described a neighbor in Cross Creek as an ageless spinster who resembled an angry and efficient canary. The neighbor, Zelma Cason, read it and sued. The case went to the Florida Supreme Court twice, and in the end Rawlings lost: the court recognized invasion of privacy as an actionable wrong in Florida, largely on the strength of one paragraph in this book, and ordered her to pay damages of one dollar plus court costs. Cason v. Baskin is still cited in American privacy law. Rawlings and Cason are said to have remained on speaking terms.

Condition

• South Moon Under (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1933): Hardcover. Later printing: no Scribner "A" on the copyright page. Jacket is priced, not clipped, and carries the Book-of-the-Month Club selection line. Very Good in a Very Good dust jacket
• Cross Creek (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1942): Hardcover, stated Book Club Edition on the front jacket flap. Decorations by Edward Shenton. Very Good in a Good dust jacket
• Both bindings sound, text blocks clean
• Neither volume is a first printing; see photographs for full detail on both
• Sold as a lot; both books ship together

Shipping

Shipped via USPS Media Mail in a rigid, crush-resistant box, each volume wrapped separately with the jackets sleeved. Ships from the Commonwealth of Virginia within 2 business days of payment.

All sales final. No returns accepted. Shelfwright.com The copies pictured are the exact copies you will receive