Ferdydurke Signed First Edition Reference

Ferdydurke (Rój, Warsaw, 1937; English: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1961) is Gombrowicz’s first and most famous novel — a surreal, comic narrative in which Johnnie, a thirty-year-old writer, is kidnapped by a professor and forced to return to school as a teenager. The novel’s central concept — that human beings are endlessly “formed” by social interactions, forced into roles and poses that have nothing to do with their authentic selves — is one of the most original ideas in modern fiction.

Signed Copy Market Values

• Signed Polish first (1937): $1,000–$3,000 (extremely rare)
• Signed English first: $300–$800
• Unsigned English first: $30–$75

Ferdydurke is the Gombrowicz trophy — the book that best embodies his unique philosophical obsessions and his anarchic comic genius.