4 Gwendolyn Brooks first editions are documented on this shelf, from A Street in Bronzeville (1945) to The Bean Eaters (1960) across 3 different publishers. Each linked guide gives the points of issue that separate a true first printing of that Gwendolyn Brooks title from later printings and book-club copies — the publisher and year to expect, the number-line or edition-statement conventions, and the tells that show up in online listings.
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- A Street in Bronzeville — 1945 · Harper & Brothers, New YorkHarper & Brothers, New York, 1945; published 18 August 1945; Brooks's first book. Collation vi, 57, [1] pp. The first printing carries "FIRST EDITION" on the copyright page together with Harper's two-letter printing code, in which the second letter denotes the year: U = 1945. Note that the Harper code records the month and year the sheets were printed, which may precede the publication date, so the month letter…. US only, and the census claim is correct. Harper & Brothers, New York, 1945 is the sole first edition of Brooks's debut; no simultaneous or precedent British edition is recorded, and there is no original-language question. Later Harper and Harper & Row printings, and the collected/selected volumes that reprint the Bronzeville sequence, are "first thus" at best — the sequence's reappearance inside a later…. No book-club edition is documented for this title — a small first trade printing of poetry. The documented later-issue tells are the copyright page (loss of the "FIRST EDITION" statement, or a Harper code whose year letter is later than U) and the second-state jacket ("No. 2322" on the rear panel, no War Bonds notice).
- Annie Allen — 1949 · Harper & BrothersWon the 1950 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, the first Pulitzer awarded to an African American author. First printing: Harper & Brothers, 1949, identified by the Harper letter code 'F-Y' on the copyright page (F = June month, Y = 1949 year) together with the 'FIRST EDITION' statement, in dust jacket. US Harper & Brothers (1949) is the true first; no prior UK edition. No book-club issue. The first printing is identified by the Harper code 'F-Y' (June 1949) plus 'FIRST EDITION'; later printings change the letter code.
- Maud Martha — 1953 · Harper & BrothersBy Harper's house practice the first printing carries 'FIRST EDITION' on the copyright page with the Harper letter date code for 1953 (year letter 'C'; an October 1953 book reads 'K-C') — the exact code was not confirmed on an inspected specimen in this pass. It collates x + 180 + [1–2] pp.; dealers describe the binding as yellow paper-covered boards over a green cloth spine (variously stated as green cloth with…. US-only true first: Harper & Brothers (New York), 1953 — Gwendolyn Brooks's only novel. There was no contemporaneous UK edition and no competing first. No book-club edition of the 1953 first is documented; later reissues (Third World Press, academic and Faber reprints) are separate later editions, not the Harper first.
- The Bean Eaters — 1960 · Harper & Brothers, New YorkFirst printings state 'FIRST EDITION' on the copyright page together with the Harper letter code 'C-K'. Under the Harper & Brothers code the first letter is the month of printing and the second the year (the letter J is skipped throughout); on the post-1937 cycle C = March and K = 1960, so C-K reads March 1960 and is correct for the first printing. A different code, or absence of the 'First Edition' statement,…. US only — census claim confirmed. Harper & Brothers, New York, 1960 is the true first; no contemporaneous British edition is recorded. Note a precision point on the census's 'contains We Real Cool': the poem had a prior periodical appearance in Poetry (September 1959), so The Bean Eaters is its first appearance in book form, not its first appearance in print. No book-club issue documented for this title. The reprint tell is the copyright page: later Harper printings drop the 'First Edition' statement and/or carry a different letter code. Later collected appearances of these poems within Brooks's selected and collected volumes are not editions of this book.
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