HAWKING, Stephen. A Brief History of Time. From the Big Bang to Black Holes. Bantam Books. 1988.
8vo. Original black-backed grey cloth; pp. x + 198, numerous text illustrations by Ron Miller; with contents or dedication, both absent in first issue; binding a little rubbed to extremities, small mark to contents page, very good.
First edition, first second issue, with introduction by Carl Sagan. Professor Hawking demanded the recall of this first issue of his masterpiece and it is not surprising. Apart from the omissions mentioned above, figure 5.2 on page 73 was misidentified as a proton and antiproton collision when it should in fact be figure 6.2 on page 95. The two figures were put in their correct places in the second issue, and it is this version that became a bestseller across the United States. This remains a book that was perhaps bought by more people than read it, but nevertheless it is a masterpiece of scientific communication, a work that explains with admirable concision and clarity concepts of the most mind-bending proportions.
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