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Spartacus — Howard Fast
Howard Fast
New York: Published by the Author, 1951
First Edition · Second Printing · Signed by Howard Fast
The Book:
The first edition, second printing of Howard Fast’s Spartacus, self-published by the author after commercial publishers refused the manuscript during the McCarthy-era blacklist. The title page states “Published by the Author,” while the copyright page explicitly identifies this as the second printing, published in December 1951. This copy retains its original tan publisher’s cloth and is signed by Howard Fast on the front free endpaper. It lacks the dust jacket.
Condition:
Very Good. Original tan publisher’s cloth with the binding and text block intact. The copy lacks its original dust jacket but retains Fast’s signature on the front free endpaper. No rebinding or later publisher issue is evident.
Story Of The Book
Howard Fast wrote a novel about a man who refused to submit to power while discovering what refusing to submit could cost a writer in America.
Spartacus tells the story of the ancient slave rebellion against Rome, transforming the revolt into a meditation on freedom, dignity, resistance, and the ability of ordinary people to confront seemingly overwhelming systems of power.
But the circumstances under which Fast published the novel gave that story an extraordinary second meaning.
Fast had refused to cooperate with the House Un-American Activities Committee and was imprisoned and blacklisted. When commercial publishers subsequently refused Spartacus because of his political associations, he did something unusually direct: he published the book himself.
That makes the physical publication inseparable from the novel inside it. A book about rebellion against political power became itself an act of resistance to political exclusion.
And the attempt to suppress Fast spectacularly failed.
Spartacus became an international bestseller. Less than a decade later, it became Stanley Kubrick’s 1960 film, with a screenplay written by another blacklisted writer, Dalton Trumbo. Trumbo’s public screen credit became one of the symbolic moments in the collapse of the Hollywood blacklist.
They tried to make Howard Fast unemployable. He responded by becoming his own publisher.
Why It’s In The Collection
Few objects in Consigned to Darkness connect the ideas inside a book so directly to the circumstances of the book’s creation.
Fast wrote about an enslaved man resisting an empire while experiencing political punishment for his own beliefs. When established publishers would no longer provide him access to the machinery of publication, he bypassed them.
That is why the collection values this second printing differently from an ordinary later printing. It remains part of Fast’s original self-published edition, issued in December 1951 while Spartacus was still circulating through the publishing apparatus Fast created in response to the blacklist. The inventory specifically treats the copy as an “active historical manifestation” of his act of literary independence rather than merely an inexpensive substitute for the first printing.
Fast’s signature makes this particular copy an especially fitting artifact of that story: the name of the writer whom political pressure was supposed to push out of American publishing appears inside a book that exists because he refused to leave.
The blacklist could deny Howard Fast a publisher. It could not prevent him from publishing.
Collection Categories: Free Expression · Political Dissent · Anti-Authoritarianism · Blacklist & McCarthyism · Literature · Political History · Publication-Event Object
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Authentication Evidence
• Title page states "Published by the Author", consistent with the original self-published edition.
• Copyright page states "Published December 1951" and explicitly identifies the Second Printing.
• Original publisher's cloth binding retained.
• Signature of Howard Fast present on the front free endpaper.
• Typography, binding, and imprint consistent with the self-published first edition.
• No evidence of rebinding or later publisher issue observed.
• First-edition, second-printing characteristics consistent throughout.
Howard Fast
New York: Published by the Author, 1951
First Edition · Second Printing · Signed by Howard Fast
The Book:
The first edition, second printing of Howard Fast’s Spartacus, self-published by the author after commercial publishers refused the manuscript during the McCarthy-era blacklist. The title page states “Published by the Author,” while the copyright page explicitly identifies this as the second printing, published in December 1951. This copy retains its original tan publisher’s cloth and is signed by Howard Fast on the front free endpaper. It lacks the dust jacket.
Condition:
Very Good. Original tan publisher’s cloth with the binding and text block intact. The copy lacks its original dust jacket but retains Fast’s signature on the front free endpaper. No rebinding or later publisher issue is evident.
Story Of The Book
Howard Fast wrote a novel about a man who refused to submit to power while discovering what refusing to submit could cost a writer in America.
Spartacus tells the story of the ancient slave rebellion against Rome, transforming the revolt into a meditation on freedom, dignity, resistance, and the ability of ordinary people to confront seemingly overwhelming systems of power.
But the circumstances under which Fast published the novel gave that story an extraordinary second meaning.
Fast had refused to cooperate with the House Un-American Activities Committee and was imprisoned and blacklisted. When commercial publishers subsequently refused Spartacus because of his political associations, he did something unusually direct: he published the book himself.
That makes the physical publication inseparable from the novel inside it. A book about rebellion against political power became itself an act of resistance to political exclusion.
And the attempt to suppress Fast spectacularly failed.
Spartacus became an international bestseller. Less than a decade later, it became Stanley Kubrick’s 1960 film, with a screenplay written by another blacklisted writer, Dalton Trumbo. Trumbo’s public screen credit became one of the symbolic moments in the collapse of the Hollywood blacklist.
They tried to make Howard Fast unemployable. He responded by becoming his own publisher.
Why It’s In The Collection
Few objects in Consigned to Darkness connect the ideas inside a book so directly to the circumstances of the book’s creation.
Fast wrote about an enslaved man resisting an empire while experiencing political punishment for his own beliefs. When established publishers would no longer provide him access to the machinery of publication, he bypassed them.
That is why the collection values this second printing differently from an ordinary later printing. It remains part of Fast’s original self-published edition, issued in December 1951 while Spartacus was still circulating through the publishing apparatus Fast created in response to the blacklist. The inventory specifically treats the copy as an “active historical manifestation” of his act of literary independence rather than merely an inexpensive substitute for the first printing.
Fast’s signature makes this particular copy an especially fitting artifact of that story: the name of the writer whom political pressure was supposed to push out of American publishing appears inside a book that exists because he refused to leave.
The blacklist could deny Howard Fast a publisher. It could not prevent him from publishing.
Collection Categories: Free Expression · Political Dissent · Anti-Authoritarianism · Blacklist & McCarthyism · Literature · Political History · Publication-Event Object
———
Authentication Evidence
• Title page states "Published by the Author", consistent with the original self-published edition.
• Copyright page states "Published December 1951" and explicitly identifies the Second Printing.
• Original publisher's cloth binding retained.
• Signature of Howard Fast present on the front free endpaper.
• Typography, binding, and imprint consistent with the self-published first edition.
• No evidence of rebinding or later publisher issue observed.
• First-edition, second-printing characteristics consistent throughout.