Books

First edition, first printing, of Mao's "Little Red Book", in the corrected text state, retaining the Lin Biao calligraphic endorsement leaf which was often removed after his demise. As with all first editions, the endorsement includes the well-known error of an extra brush stroke in one of the characters. The first edition of Quotations From Chairman Mao, compiled for internal use within the People's Liberation Army two years before the Cultural Revolution, was issued either in red vinyl plastic as with the present copy or in paper wrappers, with all first editions containing 250 numbered pages of text. According to the editor in charge, those in paper wrappers were issued first for the individual use of high-ranking officers, while those in vinyl, which took longer to produce, were intended for brigades of up to eight men. As Schiller notes, first editions in vinyl may or may not contain a typesetting error found on pp. 82-83; this copy contains the correct text. Despite the Quotations having originally been printed at Lin's behest to elevate Mao's profile within the army, this copy has managed to evade the widespread censorship precipitated by his desperate flight and death in 1971. On September 13 of that year, a plane carrying Lin, along with most of his immediate family, crashed in the Mongolian desert on route to the Soviet Union. The precise cause of his flight is still unknown, with theories continuing to circulate regarding a possible failed plot by First edition, first printing, of Mao's "Little Red Book", in the corrected text state, retaining the Lin Biao calligraphic endorsement leaf which was often removed after his demise. As with all first editions, the endorsement includes the well-known error of an extra brush stroke in one of the characters. The first edition of Quotations From Chairman Mao, compiled for internal use within the People's Liberation Army two years before the Cultural Revolution, was issued either in red vinyl plastic as with the present copy or in paper wrappers, with all first editions containing 250 numbered pages of text. According to the editor in charge, those in paper wrappers were issued first for the individual use of high-ranking officers, while those in vinyl, which took longer to produce, were intended for brigades of up to eight men. As Schiller notes, first editions in vinyl may or may not contain a typesetting error found on pp. 82-83; this copy contains the correct text. Despite the Quotations having originally been printed at Lin's behest to elevate Mao's profile within the army, this copy has managed to evade the widespread censorship precipitated by his desperate flight and death in 1971. On September 13 of that year, a plane carrying Lin, along with most of his immediate family, crashed in the Mongolian desert on route to the Soviet Union. The precise cause of his flight is still unknown, with theories continuing to circulate regarding a possible failed plot by Lin to assassinate Mao or, indeed, vice versa. After Mao and other party leaders had recovered from the drama and shock of the whole affair - Mao had had to decide whether to have Lin shot down while he was still in Chinese airspace - they quickly issued instructions for all traces of Lin and his support for Mao to be destroyed. Copies of the "Little Red Book," by this point ubiquitous, were often stripped of their calligraphic leaf, and the owner of the present copy entailed significant political risk by not doing so. READ MORE Duodecimo. Original red vinyl, title and five-pointed star to front cover in blind. Housed in a red quarter morocco solander box by the Chelsea Bindery. Tissue-guarded sepia portrait frontispiece of Mao, sepia facsimile of Lin Biao's calligraphy, epigraph leaf and title page printed in colour. Contemporary ownership signatures of one Shi Xiaosong on epigraph leaf and penultimate blank, occasional underlining and check marks in text. Vinyl bright, inside covers soiled and somewhat faded, light offsetting from calligraphic facsimile, small ink stain at head of p. 164, content still fresh. A very good copy. Justin Schiller, Quotations of Chairman Mao 1964-2014; A Short Bibliographical Study, 2014.