Trotsky Léon

1918 · ref. 87406 — Granite City IL: Съюзната Соц. Книжарница и Печатница = Union Social Bookstore and Printing House 1918. First Bulgarian Edition in America. 12mo. Brown woven cloth titled in black on spine and front cover; 134pp. Trace of rubbing at spine ends still a tight Very Good or better copy. Translation into Bulgarian of Trotsky's "The Bolsheviki and World Peace" made from the English version published by Boni & Liveright earlier the same year. The Boni edition was in fact a new translation from the German of Trotsky's 1914 pamphlet "The War and the International." Whether this translation was made with Boni & Liveright's permission or even knowledge is questionable though the verso of the title page does credit B&L with the original copyright. Granite City Illinois just across the Mississippi River from St. Louis in the extreme southwestern corner of the state was founded in 1896 as a company town by the Niedringhaus Brothers manufacturers of graniteware kitchen utensils. Between 1906 and 1908 the city became a destination for immigrant laborers from Bulgaria Macedonia and Hungary; by the early 1910s it was known as the Bulgarian Capital of America boasting the country's only general-circulation Bulgarian-language newspaper. The presence of so many working-class Slavic speakers made Granite City a natural target for radical organizing and a number of socialist presses thrived there during the first three decades of the Twentieth Century. Like all Granite City imprints we've encountered the current title is scarce and is of special interest for likely being the earliest Slavic-language printing of Trotsky's text in North America. OCLC notes only three physical holdings NYPL LC UI. Съюзната Соц. Книжарница и Печатница [= Union Social Bookstore and Printing House] unknown