Sleepers Awake by Kenneth Patchen (New Directions, 1946) – 1st Edition in DJ

Description

By the time Sleepers Awake was published in 1946 by New Directions, Kenneth Patchen had already carved a reputation as one of the most daring voices in American poetry. Fresh off the intense surrealism of The Journal of Albion Moonlight, Patchen once again fused poetry, prose, and visual form into something wild and urgent. This work pulses with political anger, surreal imagery, and deep compassion. A direct response to the trauma of war and the apathy of modern life, Sleepers Awake is also a call to the reader—to resist numbness, and to feel something deep and real in the postwar world.

This is a first edition of Sleepers Awake, published by New Directions in 1946. The dust jacket is present and protected in a mylar sleeve, showing edgewear and light rubbing, with small chips at the crown and foot of spine. Typical fading to spine as seen in almost every copy of the book I’ve ever encountered. The boards are solid, though show some fading and light spotting at extremities. Some damp staining to bottom, front edge of book. The front pastedown bears a vintage label from Gilbert’s Books in Hollywood. Most notably, the double title spread—KENNETH PATCHEN | SLEEPERS AWAKE—in red and black is visually striking and entirely emblematic of Patchen’s typographic boldness.

Sleepers Awake: a defiant postwar howl—Patchen at full force, fully awake.