INDIANA, Gary. Horse Crazy.

INDIANA, Gary. Horse Crazy.
New York: Grove Press, 1989

8vo (208 x 135 mm). [vi], [2], 218 pp. Quarter maroon cloth over black boards, in the original dustjacket, inscribed by Indiana on the front free-endpaper; minor shelfwear to dustjacket. Near fine.

FIRST EDITION, association copy, of the quintessential novel of the East Village in the ‘80s, inscribed by the author to his friend and Grove’s then-Publicity Director, Ira Silverberg. 

Set in the East Village during the rising AIDS crisis, Indiana’s first novel is a provocative roman à clef about erotic obsession: the narrator, a celebrated writer, becomes obsessed with Gregory, a beautiful, enigmatic, and heroin-addicted photographer after meeting him in a bookstore. The narrator is a barely disguised version of Indiana himself, while Gregory is loosely based on David Wojnarowicz, and the novel served as the definitive representation of the explosive downtown art scene, depicted as gorgeously and humorously as it is nightmarish.

Horse Crazy was a major literary arrival, bringing Indiana’s wild voice to a greater reading public. He had hitherto only published a chapbook, two slim volumes with small presses, and his column in the Village Voice. This was the first time Indiana and Silverberg worked together, though they had already been friends for several years. In his obituary for the author, Silverberg writes, “We met through mutual friends in the mid-’80s — either ... Lynne Tillman or ... Betsy Sussler — before we ever worked together and began a long friendship. ... I was 26 when Gary’s and Dennis [Cooper’s] first novels were published. I felt as if I was a part of setting a new tone in letters, one born of protest, something uniquely queer, that would wind up defining the era. Gary, Dennis, Kathy, and William were the writers who I would be long associated with; the ones who, whatever my role was in publishing, I would champion.”

A definitive portrait of a now-bygone era in New York City, this is a singular copy of the work — presented by the author to the man who launched his career. As Silverberg notes, Indiana “is an icon of a demimonde now mythologized by a generation who lives their version of bohemia in a far more bourgeois, less dangerous city.” 

Signed first editions are exceedingly rare and the present copy is a marvelous association, in pristine condition.

PROVENANCE: Ira Silverberg

REFERENCE: Ira Silverberg, “Bless You, Toxic Dwarf: An Appreciation of Gary Indiana by One of His Many Estranged Friends,” New York Magazine, October 29, 2024

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