[Rarebooks] FS: Robert Frost MANUSCRIPT of "Birches" with a Handwritten Letter

[Charles Agvent]

FROST, Robert. NORTH OF BOSTON with an AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED and a 
14-line MANUSCRIPT FRAGMENT OF "BIRCHES" by Frost. New York: Henry Holt, 
1915. First American Edition. Stated "Third Edition" on the copyright 
page but actually the Second Edition and the first edition printed in 
America; Crane A3.2: 1300 copies published. Tipped to the front 
pastedown is an @50 word AUTOGRAPH LETTER dated 12 May 1923 from South 
Shaftsbury, Vermont, SIGNED by the author, mentioning this book and how 
Frost would be happy to sign it if it is sent to his Ann Arbor address. 
On the first blank is a fourteen-line HOLOGRAPH FRAGMENT of Frost's 
famous poem "Birches," also SIGNED by the author with the dedication 
beneath his signature "To Maurice Frink," the same person to whom the 
letter is addressed. The fragment is the heart of the 59-line poem, 
first published in 1916 in MOUNTAIN INTERVAL, the book that followed 
NORTH OF BOSTON. It begins: "So was I once myself a swinger of birches" 
and concludes "I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree." An absolutely 
superb example of a holograph poem by Frost in a book, one of the best 
that we have encountered. The front free endpaper, which has Frink's 
1915 markings along with a much later Christmas presentation in another 
hand, is detached and laid in, which allows the book, when opened, to 
have the letter facing the poem. Gilt bright, very minor rubbing to the 
spine tips. The scarce dustwrapper has the correct spelling of "faint" 
on the front. Some mild chipping to the head of the spine just affecting 
"North" in the title and slightly extending to both panels. Near Fine in 
a Very Good dustwrapper. (#010226)   $20,000

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