Rare Book Monthly Articles - November - 2018 Issue

Where Is the New Book Collector? How About on the New Social Media

Where Is the New Book Collector? How About on the New Social Media

Where is the new book collector? Maybe where the young congregate? Certainly, they can be found on social media, and even the older folks know Facebook, probably even have a page and participate. The young have not quite moved on from Facebook, but its role in their lives has diminished. Instead, other social media are taking up more of their time, and the greatest growth the last few years has come from Instagram. Not so many older people use Instagram, but the young do. In a relatively short time (it was created during this decade), it has grown to encompass a billion members. If I had ju...

Jay Kislak:  An Appreciation

Jay Kislak: An Appreciation

Recently Grolier Club members received word that one of the brethren, Jay Kislak, had slipped away.  Death can be delayed but not avoided and we know this because, were it possible to beat death, J...

Bill Helfand:  gone but not to be forgotten

Bill Helfand: gone but not to be forgotten

Bill Helfand, [William H. Helfand], an exceptional collector and member of the Grolier Club since 1978, passed away recently at 92 and left us much to consider.  He had a drug problem, that is, a l...

Preliminary Hearing Held in $8 Million Book Theft Case

Preliminary Hearing Held in $8 Million Book Theft Case

A preliminary hearing was held at the Allegheny County Common Pleas Court in the case of the $8 million theft of books and maps from Pittsburgh's Carnegie Library. Two individuals, library archivis...

Voting in America

Voting in America

If you are eligible to vote in the US elections on November 6th I hope you will, regardless of your personal perspective.  Too often outcomes of elections are determined by who doesn’t vote.  Pleas...

AbeBooks Top 10 Most Expensive Items for the Third Quarter of 2018

AbeBooks Top 10 Most Expensive Items for the Third Quarter of 2018

AbeBooks has released the list of their ten most expensive sales for the third quarter of 2018, July-September. It ranges from a couple of the great 17th century philosophers to some of the most po...

Nick Aretakis to run the Americana Department at the William Reese Company

Nick Aretakis to run the Americana Department at the William Reese Company

A few days ago we learned that Nick Aretakis, long a crucial part of the Reese team, after a four year absence while he established his own rare book business in California, will return to head the...

Robert Chevalier de Beauchêne - The Real Fake Story of a Buccaneer

Robert Chevalier de Beauchêne - The Real Fake Story of a Buccaneer

Robert Chevalier de Beauchêne was a bold and bloodthirsty buccaneer from New France (Canada). No wonder his memoirs were highly attractive in 1732, especially since they were put together by the po...

Women Who Dared: From Sappho to Suffrage at the Bodleian through February

Women Who Dared: From Sappho to Suffrage at the Bodleian through February

On the heels of its blockbuster Tolkien, the Bodleian Library in Oxford, England hosts another important exhibit titled WOMEN WHO DARED: FROM SAPPHO TO SUFFRAGE. The show runs through February 2019...

Museum of the Bible Finds Its Dead Sea Scroll Fragments Are Forgeries

Museum of the Bible Finds Its Dead Sea Scroll Fragments Are Forgeries

The importance of authentication reared its head again in a discovery by the Museum of the Bible concerning fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls in their collection. They aren't. Scientific research o...

Abebooks to Restrict Seller Privileges for Four Countries

Abebooks to Restrict Seller Privileges for Four Countries

Recently a flurry of messages on ExLibris [exlibris-l@list.indiana.edu] indicated that dealers in various countries would lose listing privileges on Abebooks.com at the end of November.   Here is...

Raptis Rare Books Adopts Invisible Marking System to Protect Books from Theft

Raptis Rare Books Adopts Invisible Marking System to Protect Books from Theft

Raptis Rare Books has become the first antiquarian bookseller to employ what is known as "synthetic DNA" to protect its clients from theft. Synthetic DNA is an invisible marker that is placed on bo...

Now thru Nov. 14: Old World Auctions offers pictorial and persuasive maps

Now thru Nov. 14: Old World Auctions offers pictorial and persuasive maps

By the time November’s issue of Rare Book Monthly goes out, Old World Auctions’ Auction 170 will have been live for half a day or so. As always, their sale is online only, and this freshest offerin...

Important Jewish and Israeli Material Offered in sale at Kedem Auction House

Important Jewish and Israeli Material Offered in sale at Kedem Auction House

Kedem Auction House of Jerusalem is hosting a major sale of Jewish and Israeli material on November 13. You don't have to be present in Jerusalem to participate. Collectors all over the world may b...

Man Arrested for Attempting to Steal Magna Carta

Man Arrested for Attempting to Steal Magna Carta

We have it on good authority, because the Guardian, Washington Post and NBC News have reported it, that a 45-year-old man recently decided to acquire one of the four [of 13 said to have once existe...

Exhibition Catalogue Reproduces Maurice Sendak's Illustrations for William Blake's Songs of Innocence

Exhibition Catalogue Reproduces Maurice Sendak's Illustrations for William Blake's Songs of Innocence

In 1967, the acclaimed children's (and adults') author Maurice Sendak traveled to Britain to promote the first English edition of Where the Wild Things Are. It was almost his last trip anywhere. La...

"The Holy Grail of Whiskey" Sells for $1.1 Million

"The Holy Grail of Whiskey" Sells for $1.1 Million

In news from the world of collectibles, a bottle of whiskey sold last month at Bonham's for $1.1 million. It is described as the "Holy Grail of Whiskey." Holy Cow! Did someone drink up that bottle ...

Five New Catalogues Reviewed This Month

Five New Catalogues Reviewed This Month

This month we review five new bookseller catalogues. Michael D. Heaston Rare Books and Manuscripts presents an "Intercontinental Athenaeum," a collection of various subjects with most from the Nort...

Rare Book Monthly

  • Sotheby's
    Fine Books, Manuscripts & More
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s: William Shakespeare.
    The Poems and Sonnets of William Shakespeare, 1960. 7,210 USD
    Sotheby’s: Charles Dickens.
    A Christmas Carol, First Edition, 1843. 17,500 USD
    Sotheby’s: William Golding.
    Lord of the Flies, First Edition, 1954. 5,400 USD
    Sotheby's
    Fine Books, Manuscripts & More
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s: Lewis Carroll.
    Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There, Inscribed First Edition, 1872. 25,000 USD
    Sotheby’s: J.R.R. Tolkien.
    The Hobbit, First Edition, 1937. 12,000 USD
    Sotheby’s: John Milton.
    Paradise Lost, 1759. 5,400 USD

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