"Fangs - only very occasionally - & very subtle..." - Anne Rice originals bring vampire glow to Heritage Auctions

Jan. 22, 2010

Posted by Noah

I will be forthright with you: Anne Rice has never been my thing. I always preferred my vampires more Count Chocula than Brad Pitt. I know you're shocked.

Rice hasn't really been anybody's thing for a decade or two really, but that's forgivable. The incredible splash she made on the American fiction scene in the mid-1970s with her first novel, Interview With The Vampire, and her impact on American Pop Culture are things to be greatly respected. And I'm sure she cried into a pillowcase full of money every time she laments her diminished flame.

Her more dubious legacy of having left us with the translucent, abstinent, doe-eyed vampires of Twilight, I am not so in awe of - anger is more like it... but that is for me and my therapist to discuss...

Anyway you look at it, though, there are a few very interesting Anne Rice lots in the Feb. 11-12 Rare Books Auction at Heritage Auctions Beverly Hills in the form of the very first book she ever signed - an advance review copy of the first edition of Interview, inscribed by Rice on front endpaper, "For Drake, This is the first book I've ever signed - With special affection, Anne Rice".

Considering what was shortly to become of Rice and her little book, there is indeed a magic of some kind in that book and signature. Most novelists would take 1/10th of that magic for their first book. 1/100th. The estimate on it is $1,500. We'll see if there are Rice fans out there who absolutely have to have this and what that means to this piece.

The other Rice lot is a Personal Manuscript Diary Feast of All Saints, With Thoughts on the Success of Interview With the Vampire - Signed Twice. It was written by Rice in Paris, London, New York City, and Los Angeles, April 15-June 15, 1977. It's estimated at $10,000+, and is probably just juicy enough to get that and more.

Again, while it's not really my particular cup of tea, this is an interesting look at the writer's process, and it contains Rice's thoughts on her publisher (Knopf - not good) and her thoughts on the possible adaptation of Interview, which wouldn't happen for another 17 years(!). I will concede this however, it contains an absolute gem of writing when, in her thoughts on the movie, she writes:

"Fangs - only very occasionally - & very subtle..."

Nice. What other way is there, really to present fangs? Besides in chocolate cereal with marshmallows...

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-Noah Fleisher