Il giardino delle Esperidi.
Milan: Adelphi Edizioni, [1984]. Paperback. 8vo. Stiff salmon wrappers. 307pp. Very good. Faint wear to outer wrappers (only), else tight and internally near fine. Item #46434
A handsome first edition, entirely in Italian, of the first essay collection whose title references the mythological garden of the Hesperides by this noted Italian literary critic, writer, novelist and short story author (1934-2003) -- and bearing a huge, bold inscription (in Italian) to Ioan P. Couliano and signature in blue fineline dated 21 April 1990 on front flyleaf. Eleven months to the day after Pontiggia inscribed this, Couliano was shot in the back of the head and killed. Ioan Petru Couliano (or Culiano; 1950-91) was a controversial Romanian philosopher, essayist and historian of ideas, religion and culture; on May 21, 1991, he was murdered -- some say assassinated -- in a bathroom at the University of Chicago's Divinity School, likely because he proved a vocal critic of Romania's Communist post-Revolution regime in interviews and articles. A quite unusual and desirable copy.
Price: $150.00