The Grey Coast

Stokoe Code: A27
Publisher: Jonathan Cape
Place: London
Date: 1926

First Edition:
THE GREY COAST | By | NEIL M. GUNN | [ornament] | [ital.] I ken a gloghole | That looks at the sky | As much as to say | "I'm as deep as you're high." | HUGH M'DIARMID | [space] | JONATHAN CAPE LIMITED | THIRTY BEDFORD SQUARE LONDON Collation:
[A] (8), B - I (8), No J, K - U (8), 160 leaves.
p. [1] THE GREY COAST; p. [2] blank; p. [3] Title page; p. [4] Publisher's and Printer's notices; FIRST PUBLISHED IN MCMXXVI; p. [5] to | MY MOTHER; p. [6] blank; pp. 7 - 320 text.
5" x 7 13/16". Bound in blue cloth, spine stamped in gold: [three horizontal lines] | THE | GREY COAST | [ornament} | NEIL M GUNN | [space} | JONATHAN CAPE | [three horizontal lines] Rear board has publisher's motif impressed.

Other Editions:
Little, Brown | Boston | 1926
Cedric Chivers (at the request of the London and Home Counties Branch of the Library Association) | Bath | 1965
Souvenir Press | London | 1976
After the success of "Morning Tide" the copyright was transferred from Cape and a revised text, with alterations on more than 160 of its pages, was published by: Porpoise Press | Edinburgh | 1931

Notes:
For more information on the textual variations see Dr. Aitken's comments in, Neil M Gunn: The Man and the Writer | A.Scott and D.Gifford, eds. | William Blackwood | Edinburgh | 1973. and also in The Bibliotheck - A Scottish Journal of Bibliography and Allied Topics. Vol. 6, No. 4, 1972.
Details of the second edition are:
THE GREY COAST | BY | NEIL M. GUNN | [line] | [ital.] I ken a gloghole | That looks at the sky | As much as to say | "I'm as deep as you're high." | HUGH M'DIARMID | [space] | EDINBURGH | [line] | THE PORPOISE PRESS
Collation:
{A] (8), B - I (8), No J, K - U (8), 160 Leaves.
p. [1] THE GREY COAST; p. [2] by the same author; p. [3] Title page; p. [4] Printing history: Publishers and Printers notices; p. [5] TO MY MOTHER; p. [6] blank; pp. [7] - [319] text, p. [320] blank. 4 7/8" x 7 1/2". Bound in brown cloth, spine stamped in gold: THE | GREY COAST | NEIL M. | GUNN | [space] | PORPOISE | PRESS.
This is Gunn's first novel, a somewhat bitter one of survival on the crofting coast of his native Caithness. The story which centres round an old man, his niece and her suitors, highlights the decline of the area following the contraction of the fishing industry, and contrasts old and new values of the people.