Signed by Bukoski with Book Description Signed by Ferlinghetti: Shakespeare Never Did This (1979)

This is the first edition of Shakespeare Never Did This, published by City Lights Books and signed by Charles Bukowski.

It comes with what I believe is the book’s announcement for City Lights Books, which has corrections and is signed by Lawrence Ferlinghetti with his trademark initial F.

There is a significant amount of text by Bukowski, but this is primarily a photo essay by Michael Montfort of Bukowski’s 1978 trip to Europe.

Montfort was Bukowski’s personal photographer, featuring fine photographs of Bukowski in five books, including Shakespeare Never Did This. Montfort was also responsible for almost all of the biographical photographs that were included in Bukowski’s Black Sparrow Press books. Bukowski chose Montfort because he had a way of capturing him in his natural state, like a fly on the wall.

Shakespeare Never Did This documents Bukowski’s infamous 1978 odyssey to Europe. En route to his birthplace in Andernach, Germany, to meet his uncle Heinrich Fettsen, he is trailed by celebrity-hunters and paparazzi, appears drunk on French television, blows a small fortune at a Dusseldorf racetrack, does a public reading in Hamburg, and stands in a Cologne Cathedral musing about life and death.

The book itself is in Near-Fine-minus condition with a little overall wear, some aging to the white covers and a tiny spot here and there.

The book announcement measures 8” x 11” and is folded once with the text on the top half of the sheet. It has a noticeable crease on the bottom portion of the sheet below the fold, not impacting the text. And there’s a couple other light crease and a little bit of ripple to the paper.

Case 8