Harvey Kurtzman's Jungle Book (INSCRIBED)

 KURTZMAN, Harvey.

Harvey Kurtzman's Jungle Book.

FIRST KITCHEN SINK PRESS EDITION, FIRST PRINTING. Princeton, Wisconsin: Kitchen Sink Press, 1986.

Inscribed copies are uncommon, and Kurtzman's habit of adding a small drawing to an inscription makes this a characteristic example of his hand. Inscribed by Kurtzman on the front free endpaper: "Pretty Wild Stuff for Stanley Simon. H. Kurtz," with his characteristic small stick-figure drawing. A fine copy of an influential book. Tall octavo. 140 pp. Color-illustrated glossy boards, issued without dust jacket as published. Introduction by Art Spiegelman.

The deluxe hardcover reissue of a foundational work of American comics. Kurtzman first published Jungle Book in 1959 as a Ballantine paperback — the first mass-market paperback composed entirely of original comics, and his bid to make comics an adult literary form. This 1986 edition with the pages reproduced at the size in which Kurtzman had originally drawn them, and carried a new introduction by Art Spiegelman, placing Jungle Book as a demonstration of what the comics medium could do.

SKU TO-2026-089