• Sotheby’s
    Modern First Editions
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Winston Churchill. The Second World War. Set of First-Edition Volumes. 6,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: A.A. Milne, Ernest H. Shepard. A Collection of The Pooh Books. Set of First-Editions. 18,600 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Salvador Dalí, Lewis Carroll. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Finely Bound and Signed Limited Edition. 15,000 USD
    Sotheby’s
    Modern First Editions
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Ian Fleming. Live and Let Die. First Edition. 9,500 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter Series. Finely Bound First Printing Set of Complete Series. 5,650 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Ernest Hemingway. A Farewell to Arms. First Edition, First Printing. 4,200 USD
  • Forum Auctions
    Colour Plate Books from the Library of Norman Bobins
    Part 2
    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Alken (Henry). Sporting Notions, first edition, T.McLean, 1832-33. £800 to £1,200.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Bardi (Lorenzo). Nuova Raccolta delle piu interessanti Vedute della Citta di Firenze…, Florence, Lorenzo Bardi, [c.1840]. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Crawfurd (John). Journal of an Embassy from the Governor-General of India to the Court of Ava..., first edition, 1829. £1,000 to £1,500.
    Forum Auctions
    Colour Plate Books from the Library of Norman Bobins
    Part 2
    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Dawe (George, engraver). The Life of a Nobleman, first edition, Geo. Henderson, [c.1825]. £1,000 to £1,500.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: [Doyle (John)], "H.B.". Political Sketches &c., 10 vol. including The Descriptive Key to H.B., Thomas McLean, [1829-51]. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Eben (Adolphus Christian Frederick, Baron von) and Nicolaus Heideloff. Modèles de l'Uniforme Militaire Adopté dans l'Armée Royale de Suède, Rudolph Ackerman, 1808. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Colour Plate Books from the Library of Norman Bobins
    Part 2
    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Geissler (J.G.G.) and Friedrich Hempel. Mahlerische Darstellungen der Sitten, Gebrauche und Lustbarkeiten bey den Russischen, Tartarischen…, 4 parts in 1, Leipzig and Paris, [1804]. £1,000 to £1,500.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Hunt (Charles). Portraits of Winning Horses...of the Derby, Oaks, & St. Leger, from the Year 1842 to 1849…, Rock Brothers & Payne, 1849. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Kunike (Adolf Friedrich). Zwey hundert und sechzig Donau-Ansichten nach dem Laufe des Donaustromes…, Vienna, Leopold Grund, 1826. £3,000 to £5,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Colour Plate Books from the Library of Norman Bobins
    Part 2
    27th March 2024
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Lasinio (Carlo). [Matrimony], Florence, 1790. £1,500 to £2,000.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Reinhardt (Joseph). A Collection of Swiss Costumes, in Miniature, second English edition, James Goodwin, [1828]. £800 to £1,200.
    Forum Auctions, Mar. 27: Wengen (Gottfried Durst von). Die Öffentliche Maskerade Bamberg am Fastnachts-Montage 1833…, Bamberg, [1833]. £2,000 to £3,000.
  • Koller Auctions
    Books & Autographs
    20 March 2024
    Koller, Mar. 20: DADA - Der Zeltweg. Redaktion: Flake, Serner, Tzara. Zürich, 1919. CHF 5,000 – 8,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: Jespers, Floris - Peeters, Jan. Kinderlust. Antwerpen, J. F. Bogaerts & R. R. Dodson, [1923]. CHF 2,000 – 3,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: FARBENLEHRE - Chevreul, M. E. De la Loi du contraste simultané des couleurs et de l'assortiment des objets colorés. Paris, 1839. CHF 4,000 – 5,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: BOTANIK - Schrank, Franz de Paula von. Flora Monacensis, seu plantae sponte circa Monachium nascentes. München, 1811-1818. CHF 20,000 – 30,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: French Bible manuscript. Latin manuscript on parchment. With 81 illuminated, ornamental and figurative initials. Paris, c. 1250. CHF 90,000 – 120,000
    Koller Auctions
    Books & Autographs
    20 March 2024
    Koller, Mar. 20: Gradual for the use of a Dominican convent. Latin manuscript on parchment, with Flemish rubrics in black and red. Mecheln (?), c. 1520. CHF 25,000 – 40,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: Calendar. French manuscript on parchment. With 12 large colored thorn leaf initials on a gold background. Paris, c. 1380/1390. CHF 40,000 – 60,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: Freud, Sigmund. Collection of 23 handwritten letters to Alphonse Maeder in Zurich. In addition to 4 letter drafts from Maeder to Freud. 2 February 1910 - 21 September 1913. CHF 50,000 – 80,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: Jung, Carl Gustav. Collection of 26 autograph and 3 typescript letters and a postcard to Alphonse Maeder. 1911-1918. CHF 20,000 – 30,000
    Koller, Mar. 20: Nietzsche, Friedrich, philosopher. Handwritten letter signed to Richard Wagner. Basel, September 27, 1876. CHF 20,000 to 30,000
  • 19th Century Shop
    Catalogue 198 just published
    19th Century Shop. Darwin and Wallace, first printing of the first paper on natural selection
    19th Century Shop. Shakespeare’s Poems, first collected edition
    19th Century Shop. Walt Whitman portrait inscribed with a Leaves of Grass poem
    19th Century Shop. Major Elizabeth Barrett Browning manuscript notebook
    19th Century Shop. Spock's Baby Book, original MS
    19th Century Shop. Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica, the great celestial atlas

Rare Book Monthly

Articles - October - 2009 Issue

Do Not Eat This...Or, How to Lose Weight

Eat This Not That can help you hold down the pounds.


By Michael Stillman

There is a most useful, at times jaw-dropping series of books out today with the title Eat This Not That, by David Zinczenko and Matt Goulding. I will not attempt to review these books, for starters because...well, frankly, I haven't read them. Not that this would necessarily stop me. In college I wrote reviews of many books I never read. No snide comments, please. You did the same. However, I have read the abridged version, that is, samples the authors have provided on websites such as Yahoo. Besides which, the purpose of this article is to share some of my own tips on weight loss. For Zinczenko and Goulding's advice, it is only fair that you buy their books. Their advice is worth every penny. So is my free advice.

What Z&A (I don't want to write out their names anymore) did was to visit a lot of restaurants and count the calories in some of their meals, drinks, and desserts. The calorie counts are astonishing. They then recommend alternatives you can order with a fraction of the calories. Some alternatives sound okay, others sound like they are recommending you substitute for the black forest cake a sugar-free, fat-free tea biscuit. You aren't going to do it. That's the problem with so many diets. You aren't going to do it, at least not for long. So, my advice recognizes that basic fact and attempts to offer a few incremental steps. They will not enable you to lose 100 pounds, but they may help you lose 20, or at least not gain any more. I lost 20.

Most people seem to go on serious diets - special low calorie meals, salads for dinner, whatever. Most go off of these diets, either too soon to lose weight, or they put it back on when they stop the diet. It would be nice if we could stay on these diets, but it just seems that most of us can't. The problem is that too many of us look at diets as all or nothing. Either you eat nothing but Weight Watcher meals, or you eat anything you want, no matter how unhealthy. My advice is based on a middle ground. If you can stick with Weight Watchers, great, but if not, don't throw all good sense to the wind. Find a middle ground that will allow you keep your weight from going out of control, even if it is not perfect.

There are basically two kinds of food: those for which you know the calorie counts and fat content, and those for which you do not. The former includes most packaged foods, which have calorie and fat quantities printed on the label. They make good reading. The latter is found mostly in restaurants and with prepared food, where this information is a mystery.

Now I am not a perfect dieter. I like things like pizza and cake, and while I have reduced my consumption, I have never been able to stop. That's okay. So, sometimes I will find myself in a restaurant, and the waitperson will bring around the "decadent chocolate cake, with whipped cream and a filling to die for." They mean that literally. I look at that thing and say to myself, there's another 300, maybe 350 calories. This isn't great, but figuring 1,800 calories a day, once in a while, as a treat, my feeling is to go ahead. Dieting can't be all about denial, because if it is, you won't stick with it.

But wait. What Z&G tell us is that piece of cake does not have 300 or 350 calories. A normal piece of cake may, but one of these "decadent" types the waiter brings around on a display tray may contain, 1,000, 1,500, maybe even 2,000 calories, and God only know how much fat. That is never acceptable. If you knew it had so many calories you wouldn't touch the thing. But, you don't know the calorie count, and so you order the 2,000 calorie item you would reject if you believed it had a quarter that many. So stay away from anything that looks dangerous if you don't know what evils lurk inside. For example, Z&G tell us Cold Stone Creamery offers a peanut butter and chocolate shake with 2,010 calories. Who would have thought that possible? You can substitute their peanut butter ice cream, which has 370 calories. Uno Chicago Grill offers an individual "classic deep dish" pizza with 2,310 calories. They offer another pizza with 405.

So, let's say just once every other week you go out and unknowingly order one of these grotesque shakes or pizzas. That's an extra 2,000 calories, or over the course of a year, 52,000. Based on an 1,800 calorie diet, that is almost a whole month's worth of food. Is that material? Look at this way. If, come December 1, you didn't eat anything at all for the rest of the year, do you think by January 1 you would lose some weight? That's what avoiding these terrible foods you never thought much about can save you.

That's my advice. Check the calorie/fat content of things you buy, avoid items with unreasonable amounts of either, but substitute with things that you like, even if they are not perfect. Do not eat foods that you do not understand, or if you do, only in very small quantities. Avoid foods that combine several dangerous ingredients, like the frosted, whipped cream cheesecake, even if you don't know the exact calorie count. You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.

I have more ideas, but I think I'll save them for my invitation to appear on Oprah.

Rare Book Monthly

  • Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: [Langland (William)]. The vision of Pierce Plowman, nowe the seconde time imprinted..., Roberte Crowley, 1550. £8,000 to £10,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: [Shakespeare (William)]. [Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies], second folio edition, [by Tho.Cotes, for Robert Allot], [1632]. £30,000 to £40,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Bible, Czech Biblia Bohemica, first complete Bible printed in the Czech vernacular, Prague, August 1488. £30,000 to £40,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: Shabthai Tzvi.- Collection of four printed and illustrated broadsides detailing the appearance, rise and fall of the false messiah, Shabthai Tzvi, Augsburg, 1666-67. £40,000 to £60,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Leaf from the Beauvais Missal, in Latin, illuminated manuscript on parchment, [Northern France (perhaps Beauvais or Amiens)], [fourteenth century (c.1310)]. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Aubrey (John). [Remaines of Gentilisme and Judaisme], manuscript in English, Latin and Greek, [c. 1693]. £30,000 to £50,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: Byron (George Gordon Noel, Lord). Poems on Various Occasions, first edition, Harriet Maltby's copy, Newark, Printed by S. & J. Ridge, 1807. £30,000 to £40,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Tolkien (J.R.R.) The Hobbit, first edition, second impression with dust-jacket, 1937 [but 1938]. £7,000 to £10,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Blake (William).- Thornton (Robert John). The Pastorals of Virgil, 2 vol., engraved plates by William Blake, 1821. £8,000 to £12,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    28th March 2024
    Forum Mar. 28: America.- Mount (William J.) & Thomas Page. The English Pilot…, [bound with] The Fourth Book, describing The West Indies Navigation from Hudson's-Bay to the River Amazones, 1721. £20,000 to £30,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Oldfield (Henry Ambrose), Rajman Singh Chitrakar & others. An album of 160 photographs and 13 original artworks, (1833-1919), [c. 1850s-1880s]. £20,000 to £30,000.
    Forum Mar. 28: Audubon (John James) [and William MacGillivray]. Ornithological Biography…, 5 vol., first edition, presentation copy inscribed by Audubon, Edinburgh, 1831-49 [i.e. 1831-39]. £10,000 to £15,000.

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