Rare Book Monthly Articles - August - 2017 Issue

Collections can get Complicated

I’ve known for many years that book collecting, if it was ever only books, is rarely books alone today.  Book collecting was once a huge field that required decades of experience.  Today informational databases approach Einstein levels of volume and complexity providing clear pictures of rarity and value while selling databases such as Abe Books and Biblio show enormous availability.  The word rare has always been a general term but the best databases today show it item by item, selling sites to tell you how many are available and RBH to tell you what the market is saying it’s worth.     ...

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On Rare Book Hub: a reconsidered approach to Books for Sale

Over the past 15 years listing books on line has moved beyond the future into something embedded, like wallpaper, in the unfolding everyday reality of old and rare books.  Superlatives were common ...

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The Hobby Lobby Case – Illegal Importation of Some of the World's Oldest Writings

A settlement has been reached in a smuggling case involving approximately 5,500 items from antiquity, some of the earliest "books" created, cuneiform tablets from the "cradle of civilization," toda...

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Bedazzled by Burney: Sales of Frances Burney Books, Manuscripts & Images from the Paula Peyraud Collection

This month, Rare Book Hub guest writer, Maureen E. Mulvihill, has written a useful piece on continuing strong values in Frances Burney (her books, manuscripts, associated visual art). Burney, a pop...

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U. S. Supreme Court to Rule on Attempt to Seize Ancient Persian Tablets from the University of Chicago's Oriental Institute

This is the month where the earliest "books" - ancient clay tablets – make their way into the news, legal news in particular. Not only was a settlement reached in the Hobby Lobby case (see article ...

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Summer: Searching in New York

The chance to visit New York City this past month reminded me anew that, for book collectors and those who do historical research both the New York Public Library and the New York Historical Societ...

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Aug. 2: Vintage Posters at Swann including WWI Propaganda in honor of the 100th anniversary of the U.S.'s entry

As their 2016-2017 auction season comes to a close, Swann Auction Galleries is going out with a bang. Taking place tomorrow (from the time of this Rare Book Monthly publishing), August 2nd at 10:30...

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MONA. This Is Not Your Typical Library Story

A three-story circular library has been proposed to house the collection of one of the more unusual book collectors you will ever find. His name is David Walsh, and he built his fortune the way vir...

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Aug. 5: Baseball, Almanacs, Historical Documents and more at Case Antiques

Case Antiques, the Knoxville, Tennessee based auction house has since 2015 included their relevant auction records in Rare Book Hub’s Transaction History database. The category of collectible works...

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A Time to be Cautious

You can kind of feel it, the disconcerting energy of anxiety.  It’s a different kind of thing; somehow tapping into our primordial instincts.  There’s a sense of risk in some quarters of America to...

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Chastellux’s Voyages: An Aristocrat in America.

Like many “generous aristocrats1”, the well-born Marquis de Chastellux went to America in 1780 to fight on the side of the insurgents during the War of Independence (1775-1783). There he became acq...

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AbeBooks Posts the Top 10 Highest Prices Paid in April-June 2017

It was a testament to just how crazy much money collectors will spend on their passion. Sadly, it was not a testament to what people will spend on books, which is much more reasonable (that is, les...

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Summertime Fun & Browsing in the Book Arts

It’s August and in the Northern Hemisphere it’s Summer. Time for a little bookish RR.   With that in mind here are some large and small collections displayed online and brought together for your ...

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The Brooklyn Antiquarian Book Fair in September

The rare book field is tradition laden.  The way things were is the way they will continue to be, that is unless you are Marvin Getman, the show promoter, who thinks carefully and works hard to ens...

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The New York Academy of Medicine is Set to Help You Pass Your Hogwarts O.W.L Exam

Books are a place where fantasy intersects with reality. There is perhaps no better example than the most popular children's book series of this century, the Harry Potter books. They are filled wit...

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Eight New Catalogues Reviewed for August

This month we review eight new catalogues. De Wolfe Wood and Michael Brown Rare Books are offering an early printing of photographs taken by Walker Evans in Cuba in 1933. He developed this set whi...

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Rare Book Monthly

  • Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: Roberts (David) & Croly (George). The Holy Land, Syria, Idumae, Arabia, Egypt and Nubia. Lond. 1842 - 1843 [-49]. First Edn. €10,000 to €15,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: Incunabula: O'Fihily (Maurice). Duns Scotus Joannes: O'Fihely, Maurice Abp… Venice, 20th November 1497. €8,000 to €12,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: An important file of documents with provenance to G.A. Newsom, manager of the Jacob’s Factory in Dublin, occupied by insurgents during Easter Week 1916. €6,000 to €9,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: WILDE (Oscar), 1854-1900, playwright, aesthete and wit. A lock of Wilde’s Hair, presented by his son to the distinguished Irish actor Mícheál MacLiammóir. €6,000 to €8,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: Heaney (Seamus). Bog Poems, London, 1975. Special Limited Edition, No. 33 of 150 Copies, Signed by Author. Illus. by Barrie Cooke. €4,000 to €6,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: Binding: Burke, Thomas O.P. (de Burgo). Hibernia Dominicana, Sive Historia Provinciae Hiberniae Ordinis Praedicatorum, ... 1762. First Edition. €4,000 to €6,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: COLLINS, Michael. An important TL, 29 July 1922, addressed to GOVERNMENT on ‘suggested Proclamation warning all concerned that troops have orders to shoot prisoners found sniping, ambushing etc.’. €3,000 to €4,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: Scott Fitzgerald (F.) The Great Gatsby, New York (Charles Scribner's Sons) 1925, First Edn. €2,000 to €3,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: Yeats (W.B.) The Poems of W.B. Yeats, 2 vols. Lond. (MacMillan & Co.) 1949. Limited Edition, No. 46 of 375 Copies Only, Signed by W.B. Yeats. €1,500 to €2,000.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: Miller (William) Publisher. The Costume of the Russian Empire, Description in English and French, Lg. folio London (S. Gosnell) 1803. First Edn. €1,000 to €1,500.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: Miller (William) Publisher. The Costume of Turkey, Illustrated by a Series of Engravings. Lg. folio Lond.(T. Bensley) 1802. First Edn. €800 to €1,200.
    Fonsie Mealy’s, Dec. 12-13: Mason (Geo. Henry). The Costume of China, Illustrated with Sixty Engravings. Lg. folio London (for W. Miller) 1800. First Edn. €1,400 to €1,800
  • Sotheby’s
    Important Modern Literature from the Library of an American Filmmaker
    8 December 2023
    Sotheby’s, Dec. 8: Kerouac, Jack. Typescript scroll of The Dharma Bums. Typed by Kerouac in Orlando, Florida, 1957, published by Viking in 1958. 300,000 - 500,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, Dec. 8: Hemingway, Ernest. The autograph manuscript of "The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber." [Key West, finished April 1936]. 300,000 - 500,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, Dec. 8: Miller, Henry. Typescript of The Last Book, a working title for Tropic of Cancer, written circa 1931–1932. 100,000 - 150,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, Dec. 8: Ruscha, Ed. Twentysix Gasoline Stations, with a lengthy inscription to Joe Goode. 40,000 - 60,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, Dec. 8: Hemingway, Ernest. in our time, first edition of Hemingway’s second book. 30,000 - 50,000 USD
  • Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 2:
    John Ford Clymer, U.S. Troops' Triumphant Return to New York Harbor, oil on canvas, circa 1944.
    Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 44:
    Edward Gorey, Illustration of cover and spine for Fonthill, a Comedy by Aubrey Menen, pen and ink, 1973.
    Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 50:
    Harrison Cady, frontispiece for Buster Bear's Twins by Thornton W. Burgess, watercolor and ink, 1921.
    Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 54:
    Ludwig Bemelmans, Pepito, portrait of Pepito from the Madeline book series, mixed media.
    Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 79:
    Gluyas Williams, Fellow Citizens Observation Platform, pen and ink, cartoon published in The New Yorker, March 11, 1933.
    Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 86:
    Thomas Nast, Victory, – for the moment, political cartoon, pen and ink, 1884.
    Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 91:
    Mischa Richter, Lot of 10 cartoons for Field Publications, ink and pencil, circa 1940.
    Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 111:
    Arthur Getz, Sledding In Central Park, casein tempera on canvas, cover of The New Yorker, February 26, 1955.
    Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 124:
    Richard Erdoes, Map of Boston, illustration for unknown children's magazine, gouache on board, circa 1960.
    Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 155:
    Robert Fawcett, The old man looked him over carefully, gouache on board, published in The Saturday Evening Post, June 9, 1945.
    Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 170:
    Violet Oakley, Portrait of Woodrow Wilson, charcoal and pastel, circa 1918.
    Swannm Dec. 14: Lot 188:
    Robert J. Wildhack, Scribner's for March, 1907, mixed media.
  • CHRISTIE’S
    Valuable Books and Manuscripts
    London auction
    13 December
    Find out more
    Christie’s, Explore now
    TREW, Christoph Jacob (1695–1769). Plantae Selectae quarum imagines ad exemplaria naturalia Londini in hortus curiosorum. [Nuremberg: 1750–1773]. £30,000–40,000
    Christie’s, Explore now
    VERBIEST, Ferdinand (1623–88). Liber Organicus Astronomiae Europaeae apud Sinas restituate. [Beijing: Board of Astronomy, 1674]. £250,000–350,000
    Christie’s, Explore now
    PROPERTY FROM THE COLLECTION OF ALICE & NIKOLAUS HARNONCOURT. Master of Jean Rolin (active 1445–65). Book of Hours, use of Paris, in Latin and French, [Paris, c.1450–1460]. £120,000–180,000
    Christie’s, Explore now
    A SILVER MICROSCOPE. Probably by Antoni van Leeuwenhoek (1632–1723), c.1700. £150,000–250,000
    Christie’s, Explore now
    AN ENGLISH HORARY QUADRANT
    C.1311. £100,000–150,000

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