There is a deceptively simple goal for the collector of first editions: to obtain the earliest printed form of a work of literature, in as close to the condition it was in when it first appeared in bookstores as a new book. Dig deeper, though, and you find that the first edition collector also has an interest in ...
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Dublin: Cuala Press, 1941. Octavo. (xvi), (88)pp., unopened. First edition, limited to 500 copies. Title-page device of a hawk attacking a small bird by T. Sturge Moore, and colophon printed in red. A collection of letters, edited by Clifford Bax, between actress Florence Farr, playwright Bernard Shaw, and author W....
Dublin: Cuala Press, 1940. Octavo. (viii), (72)pp. First edition, limited to 450 copies. Illustrated with a unicorn device by Edmund Dulac on the title page. An essay which first appeared in "The Irish Statesman" in 1919, along with a second essay, "Swedenborg, Mediums, and the Desolate Places," written in 1914...
London: Henry Rhodes, 1687. Octavo, (viii), 140, (iv), 206, (ii). Engraved frontispiece by F. H. van Hove. First complete edition in English, translated by Archibald Lovell. Cyrano was influenced by the revolutionary ideas of Copernicus, Galileo, and Kepler. He created utopian societies to illustrate the satirical points of his political...
Pasadena: Susan and Karen Dawson, 1966. 21pp. Burgess' humorous poem, printed in purple and illustrated with several whimsical line drawings. The binding on this book varies; this copy in glazed-leather boards, hand bound by Bela Blau. With a cow illustration gilt-stamped in the top left corner of the cover. A....
Garden City: Doubleday, 1966. First edition. A novel that combines various signature Dick devices: a world in decay ruled by an immortal authoritarian figure, a protagonist who possesses the ability to travel to alternate worlds, and the trauma of drug addiction. A fine copy in cloth, lightly worn at the...
Philadelphia: Lippincott, (1959). First edition of the author’s first hardcover book. What at first glance appears to be a story about a man living in late 1950s America opens up to reveal that the protagonist is actually living in the late 1990s and performing crucial intelligence work in a war.....
Garden City: Doubleday, 1969. First edition. A novel published toward the end of Dick’s extraordinary period of productivity, Ubik presents a world of parallel time periods composed of a reality so tenuous and subjective that it remains highly dubious even at the story’s close. In a striking jacket designed by.....
(Surrey): Kerosina Books, 1987. First hardcover edition. One of 250 copies signed by Kim Stanley Robinson, who contributes an Afterword. This is the text of the first of Dick’s incomplete VALIS trilogy, which, Robinson notes, was to consist of the present title as the centerpiece, with the additions of The...
NY: Simon and Schuster, (1966). First edition of the author’s scarce second book. This copy is inscribed by Doctorow on the front endpaper, and even the inscription, “A rare edition,” attests to the scarcity of this title. Although not set in the future, Doctorow employs the science fiction device of.....
(Hammersmith: Doves Press, 1910). Octavo. 202 pp. One of 250 copies. Printed in red and black. A collection of Browning's dramatic poems and monologues, and the second Browning title published by the Doves Press. Minor cockling to pastedowns, spine imperceptibly faded, else fine in full limp vellum by the Doves Bindery. (Tidcombe DP22).
(Hammersmith: Doves Press), 1912. Octavo. (112)pp. One of 200 copies. Cobden-Sanderson's typography had a profound impact on the aesthetic of the German fine press movement that flourished prior to the outbreak of the first World War. As a result, the Doves Press Goethe titles were highly sought-after and sold well...
(Hammersmith): Doves Press, 1914. Large octavo. 203pp. One of 200 copies. Printed in red and black. This collection was first mentioned as a tentative future project along with the collection by Shelley in March 1913, with a publication date eventually set for October of the following year. However, T. J....
Hammersmith: Doves Press, 1914. Octavo. (168)pp. One of 200 copies printed on paper. Two initials in typical Doves Press style: a red five-line "C" on the half title, and a black four-line "B" on page 7. Stage directions, names, and scene indicators from The Tragedy of Coriolanus printed in red...
(Hammersmith): Doves Press, 1914. Large octavo. 181pp. One of 200 copies. Printed in red and black. This collection was first mentioned as a tentative future project along with the collection by Keats in March 1913, with a publication date set for June 1914. After T. J. Cobden-Sanderson's long illness, he...
(Hammersmith: Doves Press, 1911). Small quarto. (232)pp. One of 200 copies, printed in red and black. This is the first of two Wordsworth titles published by T. J. Cobden-Sanderson, who “planned his anthologies very carefully” (Tidcombe, 70). In an announcement for this title, Cobden-Sanderson noted that the title for this...
Guy Oliver Duncan, (n.d.). Broadside measuring 21 7/16 by 13 3/4 inches. One of twenty-five numbered copies, signed by the author and printer, Guy Oliver Duncan. Contains six poems by Duncan: "Feelings of a Lost Conviction," "(I see nothing)," "The Rising Sun," "The Spires," "Vanda," and "The Call of the...
Cambridge: Riverside Press, 1903-04; 1909-14. Twelve octavo volumes. Autograph Centenary Edition. One of 600 copies signed by the publisher, and with an autograph manuscript leaf by Emerson bound in to the first volume. The original leaf, which has been expertly and invisibly repaired along the crease, is from "Man The...
(Leipzig: Ernst Ludwig Presse, 1925-1931). Seven volumes, a complete set as published. One of 250 copies. Only 200 copies of the seventh volume were printed. The dedication notes that this edition was produced as an homage to T.J. Cobden-Sanderson and the German editions of Goëthe printed at the Doves Press.....
(Darmstadt: Ernst Ludwig Presse, 1926). Quarto. 176, (8)pp. From an edition of 250, this is one of 100 copies printed for friends of the Press. A collection of songs by von der Vogelweide, a medieval poet and minstrel, whose songs are widely regarded as the pinnacle of the era’s German...
(Stuttgart): Manus Presse, 1968. Quarto. (104)pp. One of 130 copies, signed by the artist. Illustrated with nineteen full-page lithographs from etchings by the surrealist Max Ernst. There are also three small vignettes. This is a bilingual edition of Carroll's nonsensical epic poem about a crew of ten men in pursuit...
Petersham, Massachusetts: Lone Oak Press, 2005. Oblong quarto. 89pp. From an edition of fourteen deluxe copies and 70 standard copies, this is one of five deluxe copies chosen to be specially bound for the international traveling exhibit "InsideOUT: Contemporary Bindings of Private Press Books," and as such, it does not...
Stockholm: July 12, 1950. Single 8 1/2 by 11-inch sheet, folded in six. In this letter, addressed to "Blijestra," the American novelist states his plans to visit Amsterdam, bringing with him an American trade union official whom he plans to introduce to one De Kadt. Fine.
Cleveland, Miss. Delta State Teachers College Campus, 1952. First edition. The text of a speech by Faulkner, printed with his permission. According to Petersen, Faulkner agreed to speak to the Delta Council, which was composed of 3000 farmers and businessmen from an eighteen-county area, because he needed the $400 speaker's...
NY: Smith & Haas, 1933. Octavo. First edition. Faulkner's last poetry collection published during his lifetime has a title-page vignette and dust wrapper illustration by Lynd Ward. In A William Faulkner Encyclopedia, Stephen Hahn writes that "The poems in A Green Bough are remarkable for the degree to which they...
(Minneapolis: Faulkner Studies, 1953). First edition. One of 1000 numbered copies. First issue. Introduction by William Van O'Connor. Interior of wrappers soiled with some bumps to corners, endsheets toned. Near fine in very good wrappers. (Peterson A35.1a).
