Sale 2683 - Lot 259

Wilson, William Griffith [aka Bill W.] (1895-1971)
Alcoholics Anonymous: The Story of How More than One Hundred Men Have Recovered.

New York: Works Publishing Company, 1939.

First edition, octavo; half-title present; one of approximately 5,000 copies printed; bound in red publisher's cloth, stamped in gilt; with the exceedingly rare dust jacket (jacket with two long closed tears, small area of loss to spine head and lower edge, spotting at verso, some edgewear; minor spotting to foredge, area of toning to endpapers; cloth clean and bright); housed in a custom red morocco-backed clamshell box; 9 x 5 7/8 in.

AA's "Big Book," a seminal work in the field of recovery, is considered the organization's basic text and has been translated into more than 70 languages since its original publication in 1939. The Library of Congress included the work in its "Books that Shaped America" exhibit alongside Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and other landmark works. First edition copies of the "Big Book" are highly sought-after, especially when accompanied by the scarce dust jacket, due to its profound impact on the lives of countless recovering alcoholics, their families, and friends.