Asylum Piece

London: Jonathan Cape, 1940. First Edition. Publisher’s grey cloth with black titling. Toning to spine with very faint foxing to edges and endpapers, else crisp. Dust jacket is scuffed with rubbed hinges, toning, and small loss to top of spine. Very Good.
The first work Helen Ferguson released under the nom de plume Anna Kavan marks a shift in tone from her earlier fictions. This story collection features veiled autobiographical references to time spent in a Swiss sanatorium and her notorious heroin habit as well as the development of the slipstream writing style that would be a hallmark of her later work. Being issued in wartime it was critically well received but slipped into obscurity. Rare.