Dallas/London: Riverrun Press/John Calder, 1976. First American edition. Translated from the French by Donald Watson. 220pp.; black textured paper boards; gold spine lettering; in dust jacket. Light bumping to head of spine, small sticker ghost on front pastedown. Else fine in a very good (+) jacket, unclipped, with moderate toning to edges and a short closed tear at head of spine. Signed and inscribed by Navarre to Bernard Wolff, with doodled envelope, on the half-title, and with Wolff's address stamped (twice) on the front free endpaper. Presentation copy of this early novel in translation by the prolific French writer and Prix Goncourt winner, noted for his sensitive explorations of the gay experience. Sweet Tooth concerns a young French man who flies to New York to visit a dying ex-lover, and is exposed to the various pleasures and depravities of the city's 1970s subculture. Inscribed by Navarre (in French) to New York-based French photographer Bernard Pierre Wolff, thanking him for his hospitality, his ear, and his heart. Wolff, who died as a result of AIDS in 1985, is perhaps best remembered for his photograph of the Appiani family tomb in Genoa, Italy, which was used on the cover of the 1980 Joy Division record Closer. Despite Navarre's large body of work, examples of his signature are quite scarce; we find no others in the trade at time of cataloging, let alone one with such an intimate association.
