COWARD, Noel ~ Fallen Angels. Signed by Coward to Dennis Wheatley.
First UK edition. Ernest Benn Limited, London: 1925
4to., blue publisher’s cloth with paper labels printed in black to upper cover and spine; THE BOOK a very good, clean copy, endpapers faintly offset, and some spotting to edges and prelims; the paper label along spine rubbed and chipped, with some loss of lettering, and a couple of abrasions and spots to the label on upper board; light bumping and rubbing to spine tips and corners of boards,cut advertisement for the play affixed to rear paste-down; neat Ex Libris of Tony M. Chance to front free endpaper. The book is protected in a removable mylar cover. First UK edition, from ‘Contemporary British Dramatists, Volume XXV. This a presentation copy, signed from Noel Corward “for Dennis Wheatley”, with Wheatley’s iconic bookplate to the front paste-down. Originally intended for the West End Theatre star Margaret Bannerman, Fallen Angels first opened at the Globe Theatre in London on the 21st April 1925, where it ran for 158 performances until the 29th August with Tallulah Bankhead as a last-minute substitute. Centered around the theme of two wives (who admit to premarital relations and consider adultery), there was initially some debate as to whether the play should run at all, with an official in the theatre censor Lord Chamberlain’s office recommending that the licence be refused on grounds of possible scandal. With Chamberlain’s approval needed prior to any public theatrical release, he acquiesced, claiming "the whole thing is so much unreal farcical comedy, that subject to a few modifications in the dialogue it can pass." Although Amsterdam Municipal Theatre banned the production after just a few performances in 1926, the play appeared on Broadway the following year. Coward appears to have signed a small number of other plays to Wheatley, with one or two others appearing on the market in recent years.
BINDING: Hardcover
CONDITION: Very Good
£395