Merchandise
All orders should be sent with a check to:
Gerald Nicosia
PO Box 130, Corte Madera, CA 94976-0130
orders@geraldnicosia.com
Please be sure to give your address and to specify what type
of postage. Allow time for checks to clear.
Please note that, if so requested, Gerald Nicosia will sign or inscribe
any of these items that are not specifically listed as signed by him
without additional charge.
1. JAN KEROUAC: A LIFE IN MEMORY is the first biography of post-Beat novelist and poet Jan Kerouac. Edited by Gerald Nicosia, it contains contributions by Nicosia, Phil Cousineau, Brenda Knight, Aram Saroyan, Brad Parker, John Allen Cassady, R.B. Morris, Jacques Kirouac, Adiel Gorel, Lee Harris, Mary Emmerick, Lynn Kushel Archer, Carl Macki, John Zielinski, Buddah (John Paul Pirolli), and Dan McKenzie, as well as a long interview with Jan by Nicosia and over 40 photographs. The book, 189 pages with color cover and black-and-white illustrations, will be signed and personalized by Gerald Nicosia upon request. It can be ordered postpaid with check or money order for $25 to Gerald Nicosia, P.O. Box 130, Corte Madera, CA 94976-0130. Because of increased postal rates, orders from out of the country cost $32 postpaid, and only bank checks or international postal money orders in U.S. dollars are accepted.
26 copies, lettered A-Z, were signed by Gerald Nicosia and Phil Cousineau, with artwork by Jan Kerouac (color reproduction) tipped in. These are available for $110 each postpaid (and can be insured only domestically). The A-E lettered copies additionally contain an actual signature of Jan Kerouac tipped in. These are available for $160 each postpaid (can be insured only domestically). Please email gerald@geraldnicosia.com to check availability of the A-Z special edition before ordering.
2. Jan Kerouac, PARROT
FEVER. This is the last book Jan Kerouac published (in 1994) before
her untimely death in 1996 of kidney failure. It is a 24-page, 10,000 word
collector’s chapbook, an extract from her unfinished novel PARROT FEVER.
It was published by Pica Pole Press. Less than 175 copies were printed, of
which 135 were numbered and signed in ink by Jan Kerouac. There is a two-page
introduction by Gerald Nicosia and SIGNED BY HIM UPON REQUEST ONLY.
This beautiful chapbook was set in letterpress, 10 point Intertype Goudy,
with the headings and title page hand set in Goudy Catalogue. It was designed
and printed by legendary Kerouac collector and master printer Norman H. Davis
in Santa Cruz, California. Paper used is Strathmore #80, with parrot green
end papers, and a heavy, golden tan, waffle-grain cover. Title plaque, printed
in red on vanilla paper, was hand pasted on each book, and each book was also
saddle-stitched by hand.
Most of the numbered and signed copies were given out by Jan Kerouac to friends
or sold to help her raise funds for her medical treatments and her legal fight
to save her father’s archive in a library. She gave the remaining copies
to Gerald Nicosia so that he could carry on her fight. Only a few remain.
Price: $200, plus $5 padded mailer, insurance, and domestic first class postage;
$10 air to Europe.
3. BABY DRIVER by Jan Kerouac, her first novel. First edition of the Thunder’s Mouth
Press posthumous paperback reprint, 1998. Introduction by Gerald Nicosia.
This edition contains much supplemental material, including almost 40 letters
by Jan Kerouac to Gerald Nicosia. Gerald Nicosia has created a special edition
by tipping in Jan Kerouac’s signature on a real, cancelled check, as
well as an original color photograph of Jan Kerouac (different photos in each
one); and he has signed his own introduction. There are only 35 of these special
editions, each one numbered and described as a special edition in ink by Gerald
Nicosia. Price: $100 plus $6 padded mailer, insurance, and domestic first
class postage; $10 air to Europe.
4. TRAIN SONG by Jan Kerouac, her second novel. First edition of the Thunder’s Mouth
Press posthumous paperback reprint, 1998. Afterward by Gerald Nicosia. Includes
much supplemental material, including an interview with Jan by Gerald Nicosia
in 1979; and the last interview Jan ever gave, to Dianne Jones on May 2, 1996,
just a month before her death on June 5, 1996; and a memoir of Jan by her
friend Marjorie Van Halterin. Gerald Nicosia has created a special edition
by tipping in Jan Kerouac’s signature on a real, cancelled check, as
well as an original color photograph of Jan Kerouac (different photos in each
one); and he has signed his own afterward. There are only 35 of these special
editions, each one numbered and described as a special edition in ink by Gerald
Nicosia. Price: $100 plus $6 padded mailer, insurance, and domestic first
class postage; $10 air to Europe.
5. Poster of Jack Kerouac, titled “Jack
Kerouac: The Legacy,” specially designed by renowned Sixties poster
artist Alton Kelley, and used to publicize the three benefits in 1995 staged
in San Francisco by Gerald Nicosia to raise money for Jan Kerouac’s medical
expenses as well as her legal costs to try to save her father’s archive
in a library. Dimensions approximately 20” X 28”, silk screen, in
black, white, red, yellow, orange, and a flesh tone overlay printing on Jack
Kerouac’s photo (the cover photo of the University of California Press
edition of MEMORY BABE). This poster was created in an edition of about 800.
Mint poster, sent in tube mailer, $40, plus $5 first class postage and mailer;
$12 overseas.
135 of these posters were signed and numbered in pencil by Jan Kerouac and
the artist, Alton Kelley. This special edition sells for $150, plus $8 first
class postage, insurance, and mailer; $12 air overseas.
Approximately 100 posters were printed in error without the flesh tone overprinting;
Jack Kerouac appears to have a dark, blackish face. These “blackface
Kerouac” posters are available for $50 plus $5 first class postage; $12
overseas.
20 artist’s proof posters were numbered and signed in pencil by both
Alton Kelley and Jan Kerouac. These are available at $400 each, plus $10 first
class postage, insurance, and mailer; $12 overseas.
6. Broadside of Jan Kerouac’s poem “Natasha,” printed by White Fields Press in 1996, 11”
X 25” in an edition of about 500, on heavy white poster stock, with a
photograph of Jan Kerouac at Jack Kerouac’s grave by noted Beat photographer,
Chris Felver. These contain a facsimile (not real) signature by Chris Felver,
and are NOT signed by Jan Kerouac. In fact, she had intended to sign them,
but had died before she could, as they arrived when she was already in Lovelace
Hospital in Albuquerque. Gerald Nicosia will sign them upon request. Sent
in a tube mailer. Price: $25, plus $5 first class postage and tube mailer;
$8 overseas.
7. Gerald Nicosia’s now classic biography
of Jack Kerouac, MEMORY BABE, in its current
University of California paperback. Personally inscribed as per your request
by Gerald Nicosia. $35, plus $7 first class postage and mailer; or $4 book
rate plus mailer. Overseas air: $15.
8. Gerald Nicosia’s first poetry book, LUNATICS, LOVERS, POETS, VETS & BARGIRLS,
with numerous color plates by noted Czech artist Jakub Kalousek, first edition
by Host Publications, 1991, paperback 65 pages on slick white paper, personally
inscribed as per your request by Gerald Nicosia, $25, plus $5 first class
postage and mailer; or $3 book rate plus mailer. $10 overseas air.
9. Gerald Nicosia, first hardbound edition
of HOME TO WAR: A HISTORY OF THE VIETNAM VETERANS’
MOVEMENT (Crown/Random House), available after May 1, 2001. 690 pages
with dust jacket, personally inscribed as per your request by Gerald Nicosia,
$50, plus $8 first class postage plus mailer; $4 book rate plus mailer. Overseas
air: $20.
10. 2 broadsides, 11” X 17”, sold together: Gerald Nicosia’s
poem “Jack Kerouac Returns to Lowell after
25 Years,” with a Jerry Bauer photo of Jack Kerouac, on grey paper,
done as an Alpha Beat broadside; and a spoof of the Gap ad labeled “Kerouac
Wears Khakis,” with Jan Kerouac wearing khakis in a mannish pose in order
to look like her father, on high-quality white paper. Those who order first
will receive what is left of a special numbered and signed edition of 50 of
the Alpha Beat broadsides. Both broadsides sent in a tube mailer. Please indicate
if you want Gerald Nicosia to sign or inscribe either or both. $25 plus $5
postage and mailer; overseas air add $10 postage and mailer.
11. Gerald Nicosia’s first book,
BUGHOUSE BLUES: AN INTIMATE PORTRAIT OF GAY HUSTLING IN CHICAGO, a
nonfiction novel about, and cowritten by, his friend Richard Raff, a gay man
who committed suicide because of the pressures of living “in the closet”
in Chicago in the early 1970’s. The book was published by a subsidy press,
Vantage Press, in 1977, and only about 300 copies exist—the remainder
shredded by the publisher before Mr. Nicosia could recover them. Hardbound,
207 pages, blue cloth with silver printing on spine, in dust jacket. These
are mint copies of an exceedingly rare book, the first published book of an
important American author. Personally inscribed by Gerald Nicosia as per your
request. Price: $500, plus $10 first class postage, insurance, and padded
mailer. Overseas air: $15.
Other items will be made available soon.