Gerald Durrell – The Overloaded Ark – First UK Edition, 1953

Author: Gerald M. Durrell
Title: The Overloaded Ark
Publisher: Faber & Faber, London
Date: 1953
Edition: First UK edition
Format: Octavo
Illustrations: Sabine Baur
Dustwrapper: Ley Kenyon
Catalogue Number: 004160

The Overloaded Ark was Gerald Durrell’s first published book and marks the beginning of one of the most recognisable careers in twentieth-century natural-history writing. Based on Durrell’s animal-collecting expedition to the Cameroons, the book combines zoological observation, expedition narrative and the humour that became characteristic of his later work.

The book is illustrated by Sabine Baur and retains its original striking dustwrapper designed by Ley Kenyon, an important feature of this edition and increasingly difficult to find in pleasing condition.

Condition

Binding tight and firm, with slight fading and spotting. Pages generally nice and clean, with occasional foxing, mainly confined to the endpapers and extending to the text-block. A very good copy in a very good plus original dustwrapper, slightly nicked, chipped and rubbed. The wrapper retains the original 15s. net price and is now protected in an easily removable clear archival sleeve.

Bibliographical significance

As Durrell’s debut, The Overloaded Ark is the foundation title in a collecting sequence that would later include The Bafut Beagles, My Family and Other Animals and many other works on wildlife, conservation and travel. First-edition copies in the original dustwrapper are therefore considerably more desirable than later reprints, particularly where the wrapper remains complete and presents well.

A strong, collectable example of Gerald Durrell’s first book, with the original Ley Kenyon dustwrapper intact and protected.

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