HUGHES, Langston (1901-1967). One-Way Ticket. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1949.

8vo. Original blue cloth-backed yellow boards, top edge stained blue, the rest uncut; publisher's dust jacket (some rubbing and light chipping primarily to corners, some toning). Provenance: Noël Sullivan (presentation inscription); by descent to present owner.

FIRST EDITION, PRESENTATION COPY, INSCRIBED BY HUGHES TO SULLIVAN: “A Very Merry Christmas to Noel – and a Happy Birthday, Affectionately, Langston. New York, 1948.”

During his first Christmas in his new home on 127th Street (see lot 223), Hughes was graced with “a brace of new books [which] gleamed on his coffee table [including] One-Way Ticket, with six illustrations by Jacob Lawrence (‘a very beautiful job of bookmaking indeed’)” (Rampersad, Life, Vol. II, p.159). Christmas was a time of celebration for Noël Sullivan, who was born on Christmas Day. Hughes and Sullivan exchanged gifts during the Christmas season, even when they were not celebrating the holiday together in person. In 1941, on missing a Christmas a Hollow Hills, Hughes wrote Sullivan: “’How I hated to leave Hollow hills!...And I hope it will not be too long before I return.” Spotting a ‘most amusing’ dog stocking designed for a Christmas tree, he mailed it off to California as a Christmas gift to Sullivan’s German Shepherd Greta” who Hughes had become fond of during his early visits to Sullivan in the 1930s (ibid., p. 37).


Fine African Americana from the Collections of Noël Sullivan & William P. and Alice D. Mahoney