ALS signed “Zane,” two pages, 8.25 x 11, Cottage Point (Lackawaxen, Pennsylvania) letterhead, December 25, 1907. Penned on “Christmas Day,” a wonderful, very personal and very early Zane Grey handwritten letter to his friend, Dan, in part: “I have never had a friend…I have always been a little afraid of you…because I liked you and was afraid you would soon see through me, and regarding me as an opaque, substanceless [sic] shadow, pass me by…” He also refers to his new wife, Dolly (Lina Roth), “She is a woman and thinks me a hero, and you are a man and know that I am not,” and goes on to elaborate, in a very romanticized manner, on he and Dan becoming friends and concludes the letter with details of his writing: “I have written seven chapters of The Last of the Plainsmen [published 1908] since I saw you. I don’t know how good it is, but I’ll gamble what the desert looks and feels like…the Grand Canyon…what Buffalo Jones was…simply telling the thing as reminiscence…But the story…has taken on a new life. I seem to have a different feeling for it…I’ve got the desert, and the forest…the wind…the sun, all right here with me. Well, Banzai! Old Man.” In Near Fine condition with a bit of toning to the stationery and typical horizontal and vertical folds.
Included is the book Grey refers to in his letter. The Last of the Plainsmen – A very good first edition and printing lacking the rare dust jacket. Published by The Outing Publishing Company in 1908 soon after this letter was written to Grey’s friend Dan. 8vo. 314 pages – Publishers’ attractive cloth stamped boards, edgewear with corners bumped and rubbed, spine tips frayed with a small chip to the cloth on the lower spine end and a few spots to the boards. The interior is in very good condition with some toning to the endpapers and outer edges and a pencil notation on the front flyleaf. (easily erased) Overall a nice copy of this increasing hard to find first edition.
* Zane Grey’s Cottage point on the upper Delaware river was designed by Grey and built in two sections. The first in 1905 by Zane Grey’s brother, Romer; the second section built seven years later by a neighbor and would serve as a writing studio and library after the huge success of Riders of the Purple Sage. Cottage Point is now the Zane Grey Museum. (Wikipedia)
