Rare Book Monthly Articles - July - 2013 Issue

Slow Auction

Slow Auction

For many reasons books, manuscripts, maps and ephemera get sold.  In the collectible field we tend to think of single items but there are reasons for selling larger quantities too.  It can be someone who is narrowing his or her focus or a dealer preparing to retire.  For collectors it’s the material personally appreciated but outside the current collecting scope or already passed over as other items have been sold or been consigned, in other words; the residue.  For material in all these categories and, inevitably others I simply haven’t thought of, there comes a time when the need to dispo...

Collecting Efficiently, the goal of Collectorsfolio

Collecting Efficiently, the goal of Collectorsfolio

Collections can take many forms but they share some characteristics.  One can collect books, maps, manuscripts and ephemera and never leave the world of works on paper.  Many collections are built ...

There Are Still Six-Figure Books to be Found in the Attics and Walls of Old Houses

There Are Still Six-Figure Books to be Found in the Attics and Walls of Old Houses

There's nothing quite like the story of finding a valuable old book in an attic, garage sale, eBay, or the like. Once in awhile, these dreams actually come true. One man who can attest to this is D...

More Tips from an eBay Power Seller

More Tips from an eBay Power Seller

A while back I wrote as an eBay power seller and gave a few tips I’d learned along the way from more than 14 years of selling on that the site. At this writing I have a 100% positive feedback ratin...

38th Annual Book Sale at the C. H. Booth Library in Newtown Connecticut

38th Annual Book Sale at the C. H. Booth Library in Newtown Connecticut

This past December the citizens of Connecticut experienced the horrific outcome of a murderer methodically killing small children, their teachers and other adults in Newtown.  We are grown accustom...

A Casual Tour through the Salon du Livre in Paris

A Casual Tour through the Salon du Livre in Paris

Last April, I was officially invited to a “wonderful journey” and urged to “follow the footsteps of my ancestors”... To make it simple, I went to the Salon du Livre in Paris. Since 2007, it takes p...

A Success for the London Antiquarian Book Fair

Organizers of the London International Antiquarian Book Fair report a most successful three-day run this past month. The annual fair at Olympia saw an increase in attendance, sales just slightly sh...

From the Police Blotter: Book Thief Sues Prison Over Their Library; Book Theft in the Electronic Age

From the Police Blotter: Book Thief Sues Prison Over Their Library; Book Theft in the Electronic Age

Some criminals have more nerve than others. From Lancaster, Pennsylvania, we have the story of Hans George Alexander, first reported by the Lancaster Intelligencer Journal. Mr. Alexander had the ho...

Heritage Adding Live Bidding to their Weekly Internet Book and Autograph Auctions

Heritage Adding Live Bidding to their Weekly Internet Book and Autograph Auctions

The only constant in the old and rare book business these days is change and Heritage once again is changing the structure of their weekly book and autograph auctions to give bidders additional tim...

A Transaction Reversed: AbeBooks Sells Chrislands Back to Founder

A Transaction Reversed: AbeBooks Sells Chrislands Back to Founder

Five years ago, amid great fanfare, it was announced that AbeBooks was purchasing Chrislands, the bookseller's website hosting service. At the beginning of May 2013, almost exactly five years later...

Say it ain't so

Say it ain't so

Recently Mike Stillman wrote a story about a manuscript and book theft from the 1970’s that was solved with the admission of a person long associated with the Lambeth Palace Library that they had s...

War of 1812 Archive Purchased by Canadian Government

War of 1812 Archive Purchased by Canadian Government

The Canadian Government is not noted as one of the largest buyers in the works on paper field, but last month they made a substantial purchase at a Bonham's auction in London. The bidding went far ...

Yale Libraries Purchase Largest Private Collection of English Law

Yale Libraries Purchase Largest Private Collection of English Law

The Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library and the Lillian Goldman Law Library, both of Yale University, have combined to purchase the largest library of 13th-19th century English law in private...

Auctions in July

Auctions in July

July this year is a quiet month with 49 events on the calendar.  Not so many years ago 49 would have ranked among the busiest months but the market has been changing. Tues. July 2nd               ...

Manuscript of Beckett's First Novel to be Sold July 10

Manuscript of Beckett's First Novel to be Sold July 10

“The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new.” With that happy introduction, we can report what Sotheby's describes as “one of the most important 20th century literary manuscripts in p...

Nine New Catalogues Reviewed This Month

Nine New Catalogues Reviewed This Month

For July, we review nine new catalogues from the bookselling world. David Lesser Fine Antiquarian Books has a new catalogue of books and pamphlets from early America. The William Reese Company is f...

Rare Book Monthly

  • Leland Little, Jan. 22: The First Issue of Robert Frost's A Boy's Will, In Extremely Scarce Binding.
    Leland Little, Jan. 22: Knight's An Account of the Remains of the Worship of Priapus.
    Leland Little, Jan. 22: First Edition of Locke's Important Treatise Some Thoughts Concerning Education.
    Leland Little, Jan. 22: The Richly Illustrated First French Edition of Voyages de Corneille Le Brun par la Moscovie, en Perse, et aux Indes Orientales.
    Leland Little, Jan. 22: Scarce First Issue of An Account of the Province of Carolina in America, Finely Bound and With Celebrated John Speed Map.
    Leland Little, Jan. 22: Humphrey's An Historical Account, Complete with Scarce Folding Maps.
    Leland Little, Jan. 22: First Edition of Chamberlain's Scarce Civil War Memoir The Passing of the Armies.
    Leland Little, Jan. 22: A Rare Photograph of David Bruce Brown and #48 Fiat.
    Leland Little, Jan. 22: George Cruikshank (England, 1792-1878), Archive of Sketches, Notes, and Letters.
    Leland Little, Jan. 22: Extremely Scarce Copy of Die Samländische Ode (The Samland Ode), Signed by Max Pechstein.
    Leland Little, Jan. 22: Andy Warhol's The Thirteen Most Wanted Men Exhibition Catalogue.
    Leland Little, Jan. 22: Edward Ruscha (American, b. 1937), Every Building on the Sunset Strip.
  • RareBookBuyer.com
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    RareBookBuyer.com
    We Buy Librairies & Rare Books Nationwide
    RareBookBuyer.com
    Specialized in Purchasing
    Institutional Collections & Deacccessioned Books
    RareBookBuyer.com
    We Buy Librairies & Rare Books Nationwide
    RareBookBuyer.com
    Specialized in Purchasing
    Institutional Collections & Deacccessioned Books
    RareBookBuyer.com
    We Buy Librairies & Rare Books Nationwide
    RareBookBuyer.com
    Specialized in Purchasing
    Institutional Collections & Deacccessioned Books
    RareBookBuyer.com
    We Buy Librairies & Rare Books Nationwide
  • Sotheby's
    Sell Your Fine Books & Manuscripts
    Sotheby’s: The Shem Tov Bible, 1312 | A Masterpiece from the Golden Age of Spain. Sold: 6,960,000 USD
    Sotheby’s: Ten Commandments Tablet, 300-800 CE | One of humanity's earliest and most enduring moral codes. Sold: 5,040,000 USD
    Sotheby’s: William Blake | Songs of Innocence and of Experience. Sold: 4,320,000 USD
    Sotheby’s: The Declaration of Independence | The Holt printing, the only copy in private hands. Sold: 3,360,000 USD
    Sotheby's
    Sell Your Fine Books & Manuscripts
    Sotheby’s: Thomas Taylor | The original cover art for Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. Sold: 1,920,000 USD
    Sotheby’s: Machiavelli | Il Principe, a previously unrecorded copy of the book where modern political thought began. Sold: 576,000 GBP
    Sotheby’s: Leonardo da Vinci | Trattato della pittura, ca. 1639, a very fine pre-publication manuscript. Sold: 381,000 GBP
    Sotheby’s: Henri Matisse | Jazz, Paris 1947, the complete portfolio. Sold: 312,000 EUR

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