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On Photography.

SONTAG, Susan.

  • Published: 1977 , New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux,
New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux,, 1977. Her prophetic essay, presented to her publisher First edition, first printing, presentation copy, inscribed by the author to her publisher, Robert Giroux, on the front free endpaper "for Bob, with gratitude and affection - as ever, Susan, Oct. 1977". Giroux (1914-2008) was Sontag's first introduction to the behemoth publishing firm with which she would publish some of her best-known works. Their first meeting, in 1961, was a memorable one: Sontag walked into Giroux's office, "presented him with the partial manuscript of a convoluted dream narrative, and said, 'Jason Epstein told me you're the only editor in New York who will understand my novel'" (Gottlieb). Sontag became one of the firm's most illustrious names. On Photography, one of Sontag's most influential and widely read works, argues that "the proliferation of images captured by the camera creates a culture of onlookers or voyeurs" (ANB). The work was originally published as a series of essays in the New York Review of Books between 1973 and 1977; on publication, William H. Gass wrote that Sontag's theories of photography "shall surely stand near the beginning of all our thoughts upon the subject" (New York Times). Octavo. Original grey cloth, spine lettered in silver, grey endpapers. With dust jacket. A couple of small nicks to extremities of jacket, flaps faintly toned, unclipped: a fine copy in near-fine jacket. Robert Gottleib, "Anatomy of a Publisher", The New Yorker, 5 August 2013.

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