London: Secker & Warburg, 1971

8vo, pp. 224. Original burgundy boards, lettered in gilt to spine. Illustrated dust jacket, author's photographic portrait to rear panel. A fine, unread copy in a fine dust jacket.

First edition of Banville's scarce second book, and first novel.

'[Nightspawn] holds a dear place in my heart. Whatever its faults, it contains the best of what I could do. It is incandescent, crotchety, posturing, absurdly pretentious, yet in my memory it crackles with frantic, antic energy; there are sentences in it that I still quote to myself with secret and slightly shame- faced pleasure. I love the first paragraph, the first of my first paragraphs, that place of engagement where the new reader is taught anew how to read.' (John Banville, writing in The Independent in 1994)

A very fine copy.