David Brass Rare Books, Inc

[COOPER, James Fenimore] Spy, The 1821

The Name is Birch, Harvey Birch The Exceedingly Rare First Spy Novel Ever Written"The First Great Success in American Fiction"[COOPER, James Fenimore]. The Spy: A Tale of the Neutral Ground by the Author of "Precaution." New York: Wiley & Halsted, 1821. First edition, B state (BAL opines "probable" but not definitive second state) of volume two with leaves 285 and 286 in proper position. Two twelvemo volumes (7 4 1/4 in; 178 x 108 mm). xii, 251. [1, blank]; 286, [2. blank] pp.Contemporary tree calf, expertly and almost invisibly rebacked to style preserving the original red and black morocco spine labels. Some light toning and scattered specks of foxing throughout, else a near fine copy in remarkable condition of an impossibly rare book in the marketplace with only two copies coming to auction since 1971, and otherwise found - as most American fiction of the era - heavily foxed and darkly toned throughout; thus a stellar copy. Housed within a custom quarter calf clamshell box. The copy of Grolier Club member Dr. George Staehle, with his leather bookplate to the front pastedown endpaper. "James Fenimore Cooper s second novel, The Spy (1821), is based on Sir Walter Scott s Waverley series, and tells an adventure tale about the American Revolution. The protagonist is Harvey Birch, a supposed loyalist who actually is a spy for George Washington, disguised as Mr Harper. The book brought Cooper fame and wealth, and is regarded as the first great success in American fiction" (MacKenzie, LibriVox. http://librivox.org/the-spy-by-james-fenimore-cooper)"James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851) was America's first successful novelist his principal contribution to espionage fiction rests with The Spy which, to Cooper, seemed a particularly promising theme. While the stories of Nathan Hale, Benedict Arnold and John Andre, held sway in histories of the revolution, the premise of espionage had not yet been examined in fiction. Cooper sought to exploit this situation by, for the first time, casting a spy as the protagonist of a novel."The Spy was a major literary gamble. Prior to Cooper, writers, philosophers, the military, and people in general, although they certainly knew otherwise, simply chose not to admit that spies existed or that they were in any way beneficial to the aims of 'great nations.' In their minds, the spy and his activities were dangerous, morally tarnished, and prone to scandal, illegality, or both. As a result, until publication of The Spy, espionage remained a political nether region and an unsavory arena in which to develop heroes, fictional or otherwise. Thieves, yes; murderers, certainly; but spies, be they heroes or villains, were considered well outside the political constraints of civilized society and its literature."As the first novelist to explore the theme of espionage, Cooper had no examples and instead relied on the conventions of other genres - primarily the romantic historical novels of Sir Walter Scott - to convey the dishonesty, deception and covert manipulation central to espionage activities. Like Scott's stories, The Spy is situated in a time and place of historical challenge. But instead of the 1745 Jacobite rebellion of Scott's Waverley (1814), Cooper focuses on the American Revolution, which he too casts a kind of uprising and, again like Scott, interprets the historical record through the lives of his major characters "To further refine his plot, as well as to garner reader attention, Cooper touched on a number of then, still lingering discussions such as the legitimacy of the rebellion itself, the ineptness of the British army, the random violence of ranging patriot groups, the benevolence of George Washington, and, most importantly, the social and cultural prohibitions against espionage. The gamble succeeded and The Spy received critical and commercial acceptance both in the United States and abroad "To salvage the notion of the spy's nobility, near the end of the novel Cooper employs none other than George Washington - the symbolic "Father of the American Revolution" - to sum up the fate of the spy when he personally tells Birch: 'There are many motives which might govern me, that to you are unknown. Our situations are different; I am known as the leader of armies - but you must descend into the grave with the reputation of a foe to your native land. Remember that the veil which conceals your true character cannot be raised in years - perhaps never'" (p. 398)."Herein lies perhaps the most singular of Cooper's accomplishments in The Spy. With Washington's words, Cooper defined the fundamental premise that even today continues to run though espionage novels: the ambiguity of a neutral ground wherein secret men do secret things. Secondly, and notwithstanding the well entrenched social diagram of his time - one that considered spies to be liars, traitors, thieves or even worse - Cooper's fictional context shifted public opinion toward viewing espionage as a patriotic duty, and seeing the spy in an entirely new light: the unsung hero." (Woods, Revolution and Literature: Cooper's The Spy Revisited. http://www.earlyamerica.com/review/2003_winter_spring/coopers_spy.htm)."On its publication The Spy was most cordially received in America; its sales quickly outstripped all former records, and its popularity was later enhanced by its successful dramatization. Its reception in England was equally enthusiastic. There they linked his name with [Washington] Irving's, and the two writers came to be thought of as promising pioneers in American authorship" (From the Introduction to the 1911 edition).BAL 3826. Spiller & Blackburn 2.

$US26500

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