I AM LEGEND

First edition, first printing. Paperback original. Original card covers with an illustration by Stan Meltzoff to the front cover. A very good copy, the binding firm, the spine tips slightly cracked where the glue has hardened and with a short closed tear at the head. The covers, rubbed and creased are otherwise remaining sound and without loss. The contents, with some toning to the paperstock, a faint stamp to the top edge of the closed text block and slight spotting to the fore-edge, are otherwise clean throughout and without inscriptions.

Printed in July 1954, 16 years before the first hardcover edition. Richard Matheson's post-apocalyptic vampire novel was hugely influential, shaping the modern genres of dystopian and zombie horror and popularising the concepts of a zombie apocalypse and a scientific origin of vampires and zombies. It notably inspired the equally influential George A. Romero's legendary 1968 zombie film 'Night of the Living Dead'. 'I Am Legend' has been for film three times.