The Cockatoos
By Patrick White
Published by Jonathan Cape: London 1974 1st Edition
Fine Condition With Unclipped Dustjacket
"The Cockatoos is a masterful collection of six shorter novels and stories by Patrick White, published immediately after he became the first Australian awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1973. The volume comprises "A Woman's Hand," "The Full Belly," "The Night the Prowler," "Five-Twenty," "Sicilian Vespers" and the substantial title story. Together they display White's distinctive psychological insight, dark humour and richly textured prose, examining the private tensions concealed beneath outwardly respectable lives.
Throughout the collection, White explores intimacy, isolation, frustrated desire, ageing and the capacity of possessive love to damage the human spirit. In the title story, a flock of cockatoos descending upon a suburban garden transforms the lives of the estranged Davorens, who have lived together in silence for seven years, and their lonely neighbour Miss Le Cornu. Elsewhere, brittle marriages, buried memories and long-suppressed impulses expose the gulf between social appearances and emotional reality.
Published by Jonathan Cape, London, in 1974, this is the first edition of an important work by one of Australia's greatest novelists. This excellent example is presented in its original green cloth bindings with gilt spine titles and striking original unclipped dustjacket retaining the British price of £2.50 net. Preserved in Fine condition, it is a particularly desirable collector's copy of a major Patrick White first edition, issued at the height of his international recognition."
Light wear to unclipped dustjacket. No inscriptions or library marks. Pages clean and beautifully presented. An excellent copy in very good condition overall. Please study photos to further understand condition.
