Coimbra, Edies "Presena", 1930.. FIRST and ONLY EDITION. 4¡ (25.3 x 19.5 cm.), original printed wrappers (slight defects at head and foot of spine, slight fraying at outer edges). Printer's device in red on verso of half-title. Title page printed in red and black. Uncut. Some fraying to edges of covers; slight defects to head and foot of spine. Nevertheless, in very good condition overall. Author's signed and dated six-line presentation inscription on recto of [blank] leaf following the title-page: "Meu Caro çlvaro [Taveira], Meu Amigo: // Sem [illeg.] com um abrao // [illeg.] of¼ seu // Adolpho Rocha // Coimbra 26 de Abril de // 1930." The colophon of this book is dated 24 de Abril de 1930! Extra-illustrated with a photograph of the author (4.25" x 3.125"), signed Adolpho Rocha, tipped onto verso of title-page. (1 blank l.), 76 pp., (1 l.). *** FIRST AND ONLY EDITION of Torga's second book, one of his rarest and one of the few early works published under his real name. Among the most important Portuguese authors of the twentieth century (Òfigura cimeira das Letras portuguesasÓ - Grande enciclopdia, Actualizao, X, 397), the physician Adolfo Rocha (1907-1995) was at the center of the "Grupo Presena". The Grande enciclopdia states: "Em 1930 d luz Rampa, padro de arrojo literrio seguido de Tributo (1931), Abismo (1932) e O outro livro de Job (1936; 3» ed. 1951), todos de grande audcia formal e revelando um pensamento agreste e inconformista que chamou sobre si a ateno dos crticos e do pblico, uns e outros divididos quanto adeso aos cnones literrios impostos pelo autor, mas todos, unnimemente, reconhecendo o valor mpar que se revelava na sua obra dentro da moderna literatura portuguesa." Saraiva and Lopes comment that his poetry reflects "ainda as apreenses, esperanas e angstias do seu tempo, dentro de um ngulo individualista e, no fundo, religioso de viso, e a sua pureza e originalidade rtmicas, a coerncia orgnica das suas imagens impem-se É" (Histria da literatura Portuguesa [17th ed., 2001], p. 1015). Provenance: çlvaro Taveira was one of Torga's closest friends. He was publisher of the important review Manifesto, which appeared in Coimbra in five issues, from January 1936 to July 1938, edited by Torga and Albano Nogueira. *** Almeida Marques 2271. Serpa 1266. On Torga, see also Magalhes Gonalves, Ser e ler Torga; Casais Monteiro, "Miguel Torga - O outro Livro de Job," in Poesia portuguesa contempornea, p. 235-38; Fernando Guimares in Machado, ed., Dicionrio de literatura portuguesa, pp. 476-7; Elosa çlvarez in Biblos, V, 461-7; Dicionrio cronolgico de autores portugueses, IV, 335-42; Saraiva & Lopes, Histria da literatura portuguesa (17th ed., 2001), pp. 1012, 1014-5, 1020, 1038, 1116, 1125, and 1146; and Grande enciclopdia XXXII, 105. Porbase locates three copies at Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal and one each at Fundao Calouste Gulbenkian, and Universidade de Coimbra. Not located in Jisc. KVK (51 databases searched) repeats Porbase. NUC: IU, MoU, WU.
