Fatal Interview: Sonnets

Title: Fatal Interview: Sonnets

Author: Millay, Edna St. Vincent

Publication: New York and London: Harper & Brothers, 1931.

Description: Sonnet sequence by Edna St. Vincent Millay. First edition (stated on title page verso, with code C-F for March 1931). Bound in half black cloth with brown paper over boards and printed paper spine label. 8.5 x 5.75 inches; x, [2], 52 pages. New York Times newspaper article from 2001 about recently published Millay biographies laid in. Moderate edgewear, moderate toning to spine label and interior, and offsetting to endpapers from laid-in article. Very Good.

Millay was one of the most prominent American poets of the early 20th century. The Poetry Foundation notes that this volume "is similar to a Shakespearean/Elizabethan sonnet sequence, but expresses a woman's point of view." The sonnets proved unusually successful, selling 60,000 copies during the Great Depression. Sonnet XXX, "Love is not all; it is not meat nor drink," became one of Millay's most popular poems. Reference: Yost, K. Bibliography of the works of Edna St. Vincent Millay, 42.