Why We Can’t Wait.

KING, Jr..

$20,000.00

Item Number: 138556

New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1964.

First edition of Dr. King’s third book, including his reflections on his 1963 Birmingham campaign. Octavo, original half cloth, illustrated with eight pages of black-and-white photogravures. Presentation copy, inscribed by the author on the front free endpaper, “To Orlando Darden Jr. With Best Wishes Martin Luther King.” Near fine in a near fine dust jacket. Housed in a custom clamshell box. Uncommon signed.

Published the same year Martin Luther King, Jr. won the Nobel Peace Prize, Why We Can’t Wait was his response to the assassination of President Kennedy as well as his attempt to “place the events of 1963 in historical perspective, relating the Negro’s own long search for freedom since the Emancipation Proclamation” (Oates, Let the Trumpet Sound). Includes King’s famous Letter from Birmingham Jail, published here in full for the first time. Named by Modern Library as one of the 100 best non-fiction works of the twentieth century and on TIME Magazine's list of the 100 best non-fiction books from 1923-2005.