Farmer Giles of Ham
J.R.R. Tolkien
1961* Nelson Edition
Thomas Nelson & Sons
New York
ISBN: N/A
Hardcover in dust-jacket
80 pp.
Illustrated by Pauline Baynes
Hammond Page Ref.: p. 78**
Notes
In 1960, while preparing a 3rd Impression of Farmer Giles of Ham, Allen & Unwin offered to print copies for Houghton Mifflin as they had done in the past. This time however, Houghton Mifflin declined the offer and allowed their 1950 First Edition to go out of print (or run out of stock). Allen & Unwin eventually found an interested American publisher in the New York based Thomas Nelson & Sons who ended up purchasing 2,000 copies (in two separate orders) with sales starting in March though officially published on April 9, 1962. Soon after publication Nelson ordered an additional and final 1,000 copies (it is possible that this last order consisted of cancel-title leaves only, which would then have been used to convert a large quantity of the Houghton Mifflin 1950 First Edition that Nelson had recently purchased though an intermediary).
The dust-jacket states ‘Fourth Impression‘ on the inside flap, perhaps because Allen & Unwin (who supplied the jackets and who had already printed their 3rd Impression) wanted to cut costs by printing jackets for their future 4th Impression along with the Nelson & Sons order. By 1965, Allen & Unwin had decided to issue their 4th Impression jointly with Houghton Mifflin, who had chosen to resume publishing the book themselves the previous year, shortly after Nelson & Sons reported their stock depleted. These complications led to many of the copies (particularly in the U.K.) being sold with a dust-jacket marked one impression/printing ahead of the enclosed book.
The dust-jacket has a blank back cover most likely because Allen & Unwin sold Nelson & Sons jackets that they would also be using (and they used that space to advertise information about their own U.K. based publications).
1st Printing: April 9, 1962* – 2,000 copies
2nd Printing: 1962 – 1,000 copies***
Jacket price: $2.95.
For more information/speculation concerning the publication detail of this edition, see this discussion at the Tolkien Collector’s Guide forum: www.TolkienGuide.com/FarmerGiles/1961.
*The copyright for this book was transferred to Nelson & Sons in 1961. The first batch of the first printing was produced at the end of that year.
**Mr. Hammond has since stated that this Bibliography entry may include some incorrect assumptions; he had not seen a copy of this edition at the time of writing.
***As none have yet been seen, the 2nd Printing may be identical to the 1st aside from (perhaps) a cancel title leaf, with no distinguishing information added to the copyright page.
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| Farmer Giles of Ham (1950) | Farmer Giles of Ham (1965) |