Casino Royale, Ian Fleming. First Edition, 1953. Peter Harrington Rare Books

Casino Royale, Ian Fleming. First Edition, 1953. London: Jonathan Cape, 1953.

Octavo. Original black cloth, titles to spine in red, heart device to front cover in red, bottom edges untrimmed. With the illustrated dust jacket. Housed in a custom black quarter morocco solander box. Spine very gently rolled, top edge faintly toned, light foxing to endpapers. An excellent copy in the bright, entirely unrestored dust jacket with a hint of spotting to the rear panel and a couple of minor markings to the flaps.

First edition, first impression, in the first issue dust jacket. Presentation copy, inscribed by the author on the front free endpaper, “To Ralph, we have now both reduced our remainders by one copy! Ian”. An evocative association: Ralph Arnold and Fleming studied together at the Tennerhof school in Kitzbühel, Austria, and it was there that both made their first forays into story-writing. Having left Sandhurst without obtaining a commission, “Fleming was sent to ‘sort himself out’ at a quasi-finishing school for men in Kitzbühel … There, while skiing and climbing mountains, he came under the benevolent tutelage of Ernan Forbes Dennis, a former British spy turned educationalist, and his wife, Phyllis Bottome, an established novelist. Forbes Dennis brought out Fleming's aptitude for languages and introduced him to literature, while his wife encouraged him to write his first stories” (ODNB). In the evenings Bottome “would gather her young men around her … and begin to weave a tale. They were expected to contribute their own embellishments to the story. The competition to tell the most spell-binding saga was often palpable since two other pupils, apart from Ian, went on to become writers – Ralph Arnold … and Nigel Dennis … All subsequently attested to the profound influence Phyllis Bottome had on their work and choice of career” (Andrew Lycett, Ian Fleming, ch. 2).

“According to the Cape archives, 4760 sets of sheets of the first printing were delivered, but only 4728 copies were bound up. Many of these went to public libraries and we believe that less than half of the first printing was sold to the public. The jacket is genuinely rare in fresh condition” (Biondi & Pickard, 40). Arnold’s own inscription, written below Fleming’s, forms a wry reflection on the unexpected success of the novel that would launch a career: “I having told Ian, from the depths of my publishing experience, that he would be lucky if he made £200 out of his, his first thriller!! R.A.”