Agapē Agape

First edition. 8vo. 113pp. Pale grey backstrip over speckled white boards, titled in silver to spine; uncut fore-edges. Afterword by Joseph Tabbi, Notes. Jacket design by Sherri Copeland Kapperstein.

Winner of the National Book Award for both J R and A Frolic of His Own. Author's fifth and final novel, published posthumously. A dramatic monologue against the ills of modern society embarked by an elderly man on his deathbed. This piercing diatribe was distilled from voluminous notes accumulated over half a century by the author "about the mechanization of the arts, [as] told via a social history of the player piano in America". "[T]he last word of one of the most significant American authors of the last century." –Stephen Burn, Times Literary Supplement