Lawrence, D[avid] H[erbert]. THE RAINBOW

London: Methuen, [1915]. First edition. 8vo. Laid into this copy is an historic Lawrence ALS to his agent, J. B. Pinker, dated "17 Nov. 1915," in which he reacts emotionally to the seizure by the police of most of the edition of "The Rainbow" because of the novel's alleged sexual explicitness. Lawrence asks: "Must I stay for the proceedings about The Rainbow? Must I appear? ... I have had letters from a lot of people about The Rainbow ... I want to do what I can for the book. Also I want to go away [on a trip to America]. I will stay if it is any good." The letter clearly evinces Lawrence's puzzlement over the novel's suppression, of which only 821 copies of a total edition of 2500 copies survived and were subsequently distributed. Remarkably, this copy, as-new in an as-new dust jacket, seemingly lay untouched from the time of its publication and was not exposed to any physical element that might have compromised its singular beauty. Housed in a custom-made quarter morocco clamshell box.