Hello Towns, Sherwood Anderson. Signed First Edition.

Sherwood Anderson (1846-1941) was an American novelist and short story writer. He was self-educated, and managed to become a successful business owner in Ohio. In 1912, he had a nervous breakdown which led him to abandon his business and family and become a writer. Anderson rose to prominence as a writer with his second book, a collection of short stories titled Winesburg, Ohio. He was one of the first American novelists to introduce concepts from Freudian analysis into his work and, according to Daniel Fogel, "Instead of emphasizing plot and action, Anderson used a simple, precise, unsentimental style to reveal the frustration, loneliness, and longing in the lives of his characters. These characters are stunted by the narrowness of Midwestern small-town life and by their own limitations."

Throughout his life, Anderson frequently contributed articles to newspapers. Hello Towns, published in 1929, is a collection of these articles. It's an illuminating read, a sort of documentarian's look into poor and rural midwestern life in the early twentieth century. This is the second printing, inscribed by Anderson on the flyleaf:

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