MANN, Thomas
 
Die Betrogene (The Black Swan); first published in German by S. Fischer Verlag, Frankfurt in 1953.
 
Description
 
First edition, first impression, of Mann’s final completed novella, an exceptional copy preserved with rare publisher’s ephemera.
Octavo. Original red cloth, spine and front cover lettered in white. With the original green pictorial dust jacket designed by Martin Kausche. Contemporary ownership inscription to the upper margin of the front free endpaper.
Small bookseller’s ticket of "Lola Mayer Books, Stoke Poges" to the lower margin of the front pastedown.
Tucked inside the front flap is the publisher’s scarce, original loose Drucksache (printed matter) promotional slip.
The Black Swan represents the twilight of Mann’s career. Written in Swiss exile concurrently with his work on Felix Krull, this dark, unsettling narrative serves as a late-life companion piece to Der Tod in Venedig (1912).
The bookseller's ticket locates the volume at Plough Grey House in Stoke Poges, Buckinghamshire, home to Lola Mayer Books. Lola Mayer (née Grussemann), a German-Jewish émigré, established the specialized import firm alongside her husband, the eminent political theorist and Alexis de Tocqueville scholar J. P. Mayer. Their son, Peter Mayer, spent his childhood immersed in this inventory before eventually becoming the legendary, transformative CEO of Penguin Books.
The original red cloth remains vibrant and unfaded beneath the jacket, with crisp binding edges and clean white lettering. Internally fresh with only light, natural toning to the endpapers; the ownership inscription is small and neat. The dust jacket is unclipped, showing only minor edge-wear and chipping to the extremities.
A highly collectible, cohesive specimen of modern German literature.