The Silver Sword

First edition, first impression.  186pp, with coloured frontispiece and line drawings in text, all from drawings by C Walter Hodges.  Buff cloth-covered boards with black lettering and drawing on spine.  Cloth slightly pushed at corners and spine ends.  Text block edges, particularly the upper edge, dust dulled.  Initials in felt tip on front paste down; endpapers a little spotted, hint of toning to first and last few leaves, else internally neat, clean and bright.  Firmly bound and square.  In its original illustrated dust wrapper, priced at 10s 6d, worn, chipped all round edges, toned on verso, bumped along upper edge with crumbling and minor loss at spine ends.  Dust jacket now protected in an archival quality Mylar wrapper fitted without the use of tape or adhesives.

Published in the US with the title Escape from Warsaw, The Silver Sword is the semi-fictionalisd story of a Polish family during the Second World War: the account of the Red Army on the march is derived from eye witness accounts in Jan Stransky’s East Wind Over Prague.  A classic tale which had a profound impact on a generation. John Boyne, author of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (2006) said of Serrailler’s novel “the book stands out for me as a great children’s classic – [it] was my first introduction to the Second World War in fiction, to the horrors of the Nazi era, and the fear that capture could instil”.  Scarce in its first edition.