Setting Free the Bears.

IRVING, John.

Item Number: 56980

New York: Random House, 1968.

First edition, second printing of the author’s first book. Octavo, original half cloth. Presentation copy, inscribed by the author on the half-title page, “For Elias Kanner John Irving.” Fine in a near fine price-clipped dust jacket. Jacket design by Carl Weiss. Illustration by Robert Dale.

With the publication of Setting Free the Bears, the Saturday Review prophetically called Irving "astonishing A writer of uncommon imaginative power. Whatever he writes, it will be worth reading." "Setting Free the Bears is the most nourishing, satisfying comedy I have read in years. I admire the hell out of it" (Kurt Vonnegut Jr.).