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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NY: Benjamin Blom, Inc., 1972. Folio. 202, (5)pp. Publisher's facsimile of the famed edition of Hamlet issued by the Cranach Press in 1929. With reprints of Edward Johnston's typography, Edward Gordon Craig's 74 woodcuts, and Eric Gill's contributions of two initials, the title over the first woodcut, and spine titling... More about Facsimile of the Cranach Press Hamlet
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... More about If I Were Four-and-Twenty
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... More about The Comical History of the States and Empires of the Worlds of the Moon and the Sun
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 fine... More about The Miniature Purple Cow
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... More about Now Wait For Last Year
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..... More about Time Out of Joint
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..... More about Ubik
(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... More about VALIS. Together with: Cosmogony and Cosmology
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..... More about Big As Life
(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). More about Dramatis Personae
(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... More about Iphigenie auf Tauris
(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.... More about Keats
(Hammersmith): Doves Press, 1914. Two octavo volumes. 203; 181pp. Each volume one of 200 copies. Both printed in red and black. This collection was first mentioned as a tentative future project in March 1913, with a publication date eventually set for October of the following year. However, T. J. Cobden-Sanderson's... More about Keats and Shelley
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... More about The Tragedy of Coriolanvs
(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... More about Shelley
(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... More about A Decade of Years
London: Faber and Faber Limited, 1939. First edition. Eliot's living-room drama, written partly in blank verse and partly in prose, and emulating both Greek drama and pulp detective plays. Bound in gray cloth with red lettering to spine. Covers and endpapers noticeably toned, dust wrapper minorly chipped and with discoloration... More about The Family Reunion
New Rochelle, NY: Elston Press, 1902. Octavo. (viii), 116pp. One of 160 copies. Sharp and robust title pages and initials by H. M. O'Kane, expressing the clear influences of William Morris at the Kelmscott Press and Charles Ricketts at the Vale Press. Keats' celebrated love poem printed in red and... More about Endymion
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... More about The Complete Works. Together with: The Journals
(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..... More about Works
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... More about Of Woodland Pools, Spring-Holes & Ditches
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. More about Autograph letter, signed
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... More about An Address Delivered . . . At The Seventeenth Annual Meeting of Delta Council
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... More about A Green Bough
(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). More about Mirrors of Chartres Street
