Publication
After years of misunderstandings, accusations of duplicity, and hurried letters, Thomas Seltzer finally published the first edition of Women in Love in New York City in 1920. This had come after three drawn out years of delays and revisions. This first limited edition (1250 books) was available only to subscribers; this was due to the controversy caused by his previous work, The Rainbow. Originally, the two books were written as parts of a single novel. The publisher had decided to publish them separately and in rapid succession. The first book's treatment of sexuality, while tame by 21st Century standards, was frank for the mores of the time. There was an obscenity trial and The Rainbow was banned in the U.K. for 11 years, although it was available in the U.S. The publisher then backed out of publishing the second book in the U.K., so it first appeared in the U.S. Complications also arose when Lawrence faced a libel suit by Lady Ottoline Morrell and others, who claimed their likenesses were unjustly drawn upon in The Rainbow.
Read more about this topic: Women In Love
Famous quotes containing the word publication:
“I would rather have as my patron a host of anonymous citizens digging into their own pockets for the price of a book or a magazine than a small body of enlightened and responsible men administering public funds. I would rather chance my personal vision of truth striking home here and there in the chaos of publication that exists than attempt to filter it through a few sets of official, honorably public-spirited scruples.”
—John Updike (b. 1932)
“Of all human events, perhaps, the publication of a first volume of verses is the most insignificant; but though a matter of no moment to the world, it is still of some concern to the author.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“An action is the perfection and publication of thought. A right action seems to fill the eye, and to be related to all nature.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)