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 ...
Read more about Literature
London: Macmillan and Co. 1889, 1893. Two octavo volumes. xxiii, 400pp., + 3pp. advertisements; xxxi, 423 pp., + 5 pp. advertisements. First editions. Each volume inscribed to "Mrs. Morgan" by the author on the half-title, the first volume bearing Carroll's handwritten date of December 12. Apparently, this is the same... More
NY: Henry Holt, 1914. Octavo. (144) pp. First edition, second issue, binding "B" of Frost's second regularly published book. One of 150 copies bound from sets of sheets from David Nutt, Frost's English publisher with Holt title page on a cancel stub. This was published on 20 February, 1915, and... More
Edinburgh & London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1925; 1926. Two octavo volumes. First edition of the Scottish poet Hugh M'Diarmid's first collection of poetry, in the second binding, together with a first edition of his second book. Hugh M'Diarmid, or MacDiarmid, as it is more commonly written, was the pen... More
NY: Harper & Brothers, 1849. Two octavo volumes. 365; 387pp., + 8pp. ads. First American edition. Mardi was Melville's third book, and his third on the theme of South Pacific exploration. In the novel, an American sailor deserts his whaling ship in order to pursue his own adventures. At the... More
Worcester: Stanbrook Abbey Press, 1965. Small quarto. 81pp. One of 500 copies beautifully printed in red, black, and green on handmade paper. Title-page decorations by Margaret Adams. Lithographed portrait of the author tipped in. With an English translation on each page facing the original French text by Raissa Maritain, who... More
Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott, 1960. First edition. Winner of the 1960 Hugo Award. Miller’s quirky, significant novel was among the first in the modern science fiction canon to develop futuristic themes around religion: here, a monastic order in whose charge were a number of books saved from “the first Atomic Deluge”... More
London: Methuen, (1927). First edition. This famous collection of children’s verses, featuring Milne’s son, Christopher Robin, and his bear, is illustrated throughout with Ernest H. Shepard’s whimsical drawings. Signed at a later date on the title page by Shepard. Handsomely bound by Bayntun-Rivière in deep red morocco, with gilt ruled... More
(Minneapolis): Minnesota Center for Book Arts, 2005. Tall quarto. (48)pp. From an edition of 226, this is one of 26 lettered copies, specially bound and with tipped-in editioned prints by five Minnesota artists. An anthology of original poetry from twelve Minnesota writers, including Robert Bly, Adrian Louis, Susan Steger Welsh... More
(Verona: Riva, Franco, 1976). Folio. 37pp., + (6)ff. plates. One of 75 copies, signed by the poet. Six poems by the Italian poet and Nobel Laureate Eugenio Montale, accompanied by six full-page etchings in sanguine of drawings by the poet. Several of the illustrations depict seaside scenes from the poet’s... More
Portland, Maine: Mosher, Thomas B. 1904. Octavo. 41pp. From an edition of fifty numbered copies, this is one of forty offered for sale. Printed on Japan vellum in red and black from the plates of The Bibelot, Vol. 10, June 1904. Illustrated with a frontispiece portrait of the author, with... More
Soho: Nonesuch Press, 1923. Small quarto. xxiii, 91, (7)pp. From an edition of 1,200 copies, this is one of twenty ad personam copies, specially bound. This is the first book of Francis Meynall’s Nonesuch Press. Meynall, along with his wife, Vera, who selected and edited Donne’s text for this production... More
Cleveland: (Jos. Leon Gobeille), 1902. Small quarto. (30)pp. One of 93 copies printed on Imperial Japan paper. With illustrations from pen-and-ink drawings by Robert H. Perdue. This is a reproduction in smaller format of a folio version issued by Perdue in 1900 in an edition of five copies. According to... More
Utrecht, The Netherlands: Catharijne Press, 1984. 20pp. One of 100 copies, with an artistic photogravure frontispiece by Johan de Zoete, which is signed and numbered. The two poems are "To Helen," and "Annabel Lee." Extremely fine oblong miniature; the first published by Catharijne Press. Bound in black morocco with a.... More
Paris and Dublin: Imprimerie Arte Adrien Maeght, 1981. Quarto. Eleven unbound folios with eight lithographic prints of charcoal drawings inserted. One of twenty-five copies hors commerce of a 100-copy edition. Signed by Le Brocquy on each drawing and at colophon. A collection of poems written by some of the best... More
London: Frederick Warne, 1913. 12mo. 94pp. First edition. First or second printing (they were identical), with date on title-page. Contains fourteen color plates, among Potter's most endearing. The story concerns two real pigs at her own Hill Top Farm, which is the setting for several of the illustrations. At the... More
Boston: Small, Maynard, (1910). Octavo. First edition, second binding. Head of spine bumped and paper starting to split along upper hinge, else a near fine copy of Pound's first book printed in America. In dust wrapper with a few small chips to extremities. (Gallup A6). More
(Hammersmith: Kelmscott Press, 1895). Three octavo volumes. 399; 412; 421pp. One of 250 copies. Ornate wood-engraved double-page opening in Volume I and initials and borders throughout the three volumes by William Morris. In a letter to a friend in 1855, William Morris wrote that he had just been reading Shelley's... More
Hamburg: Raamin-Presse, 1976. Quarto. (40)pp. From an edition of 170, this is one of twenty copies with an additional two plates signed and numbered by the printer and illustrator, Roswitha Quadflieg. Translated into German from the original French by Elmar Tophoven, the short story "L'Expulsé" ("The Expelled") first appeared in... More
(Hamburg): Raamin-Presse, 1977. Quarto. 24pp. From an edition of 120 numbered copies signed by the artist/printer, Roswitha Quadflieg, this is one of forty copies printed in English, and from those forty, this is also one of ten with an extra signed etching. The text is from Adventures in the Skin... More
Charleston: Poetry Society of South Carolina, 1923. Octavo. First edition. First appearance of this poem, which was awarded the Poetry Society of South Carolina's Southern Prize for 1923. This publication also prints the poems which received honorable mention: "A Fragment" by William Alexander Percy, and "Avalon" by Donald Davidson. This... More
Philadelphia: N.p. 1936. (5)ff. A signed typewritten speech, given by Franklin Delano Roosevelt on June 27, 1936, in acceptance of his nomination as the Democratic candidate for president. Roosevelt signed the speech at the end in blue ink, and the pages have sixteen corrections in blue pencil, with one sentence... More
NY: Henry Holt, 1916. First edition. First issue with dated advertisement at rear. Sandburg's first regularly published book, preceded by two privately-printed pamphlets. Spine gilt a trifle dull, else about fine in dust wrapper which shows some chipping at spine ends, and a horizontal crease at upper front panel. More
(Cambridge): 1930. Small octavo. 6ff. Group of seven manuscript love poems written by Sarton and presented as a Christmas gift to her teacher, Anne Longfellow Thorp. Four of these poems were published in the December, 1930 issue of Poetry magazine -- Sarton's first appearance in print. The four poems, which... More
London: Lockwood & Co. 1864. Octavo. (4), 204pp. First edition. Inscription on recto of frontispiece identifies author: “Geo. Evans presented to him by the Author H. Cowen the 20 Sept. 1866.” In standard references and OCLC previous to this copy’s discovery, the book was recorded as anonymous or according to... More
Cambridge, MA: Advocate House, 1950. Quarto. 24pp. Volume 134, number one. This is identified as the "Registration Issue" on the front cover, published September, 1950. Features a cover illustration by Edward Gorey, known as "Two Professors," showing two Mr. Earbrass-style characters throwing sticks at two hooded heads on pikes. This... More
