This unique copy of Szuts’ wordless novel, My War, is believed to be a production copy annotated by H. Arnold, an employee of the publisher, John Lane The Bodley Head. Company records indicate he was age 16 when he annotated this copy.

Extract from an email Apr 5, 2023, Bonner to Martens: I can be confident that your edition is a production copy for a number of reasons. The binding in brown paper, with title and brief description typed and stuck to the spine, is very typical of early production copies. As are the hand-written notes within, and the handwritten price on the spine. This is something you will see in file and production copies well into the 20th century. These do not differ massively from proof copies, as they were likely produced at the same time, but the addition of notes from members of staff like H. Arnold tell us that it was being used in office to mock-up changes to the final edition.*

Thanks go to Esmé Bonner (Library and Archive Assistant, Penguin Random House UK Archive & Library) for diligently researching the matter, including information about H. Arnold.

*NOTE: Penguin Random House UK Archive & Library are not experts in antiquarian/rare books or publishing and accordingly make no representations or warranties regarding any information supplied by the PRH UK Archive & Library in response to a detailed query.

Pencilled notation on thin card used for the cover.

The spine label is worn with portions missing but the best guess is
that it reads, “My War ?204? Illustrations reproduced in facsimile.
With an introduction by R. H. Mottram ?????? C?? 15s.”

Images in this copy have handwritten numbering in pencil unlike the numbers in the book, which are printed with the image.

The pencil notations appear to be by H. Arnold.
“£35” and “Proof” were presumably added by
a book dealer at some later date.
  • This copy is bound with 204 images; no title page or index of titles for the images
  • The images are of identical size to the published book and done with the same process BUT are printed without image numbers ie numbers for the final publication must have been added later to the plate or the plates were redone with numbers added.
  • Each page in this copy (up to image 200) has a title in pencil under the image. In the published book, an index of titles (with image number) are listed towards the beginning of the book.
  • The 1931 publication has 206 images (everything this proof copy has plus two more). Also Production image 204, is 205 in the publication.
  • The front cover has a pencilled title; the spine has printed label stuck on.

The original drawings do not appear to have been numbered and there may have been some flexibility in the order to view the images.

  • In addition the drawings had titles but the published book frequently changed the image title.
  • This production copy is slightly different from the published book ie it was still a work in progress
  • Image 171 below is an example of where the title may have been changed
The title was changed from “forward” to “backward”.

Each image in this production copy has a pencil line under it with a title written on the line.

  • Titles end with image 200,
  • This production copy has 204 images with the last four untitled,
  • The final publication has 206 images with the last six untitled,
  • In any event the index of image titles in the published book only goes up to #200.
Titled, Execution for #200 but untitled for #201 and thereafter.
Images 200 and 201 in the published book with printed numbers for
the images versus the pencilled numbers in the production copy.

Thanks go to Tanis Thacker who went above and beyond in obtaining photographs as well in contributing her insights.

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