Evans, Walker. Let Us Now Praise Famous Men by James Agee and Walker Evans.

Houghton Mifflin, 1960. Apparently the first printing [no later printings indicated] of the second edition of this classic about tenant farmers in Alabama, with 61 photographs by Evans, about twice as many as in the first edition published in 1941. Summary:

• Overview: Let Us Now Praise Famous Men is a landmark 1941 non-fiction book combining text by writer James Agee and photographs by Walker Evans to document the lives of impoverished sharecropper families in the American South during the Great Depression.

• Origins: The project originated in the summer of 1936 when Agee and Evans were sent by Fortune magazine on an assignment to document the daily lives of cotton tenant farmers in Hale County, Alabama. The magazine ultimately rejected the article, leading Agee to expand it into an independent book.

• Structure and Style: The work is divided into distinct sections blending intense poetic lyricism, sociological detail, moral philosophy, and direct observation. It famously avoids traditional journalistic detachment, with Agee deeply interrogating the ethics of observation, exploitation, and his own role as an outsider.

• Photography: Evans' contribution features unvarnished, direct, and dignity-infused black-and-white portraits of families such as the Burroughs, Fields, and Tills, along with stark images of their homes, clothing, and surroundings, presented independently at the beginning of the volume without traditional captions.

• Legacy: Though initially a commercial failure, the book has since been recognized as a masterwork of American literature and documentary art, celebrated for its profound empathy, moral complexity, and unflinching look at rural poverty.

Copies available:

• Hard cover, 1960, black cloth, in near very good condition, with wear to spine tip and lettering, signature and discreet blind stamp of previous owners on flyleaf, no dust jacket. 
• Hard cover, 1969, presumed 1st printing of 1969 edition [no later printings indicated], identical in format and content to 1960 edition, fine with VG+ dust jacket.  (out of stock)
• Paperback reprint. Houghton Mifflin, 2001. Very good with minor cover indentations.