Our members list new acquisitions and recently cataloged items almost every day of the year. Below, you'll find a few highlights from these recent additions...
Original ink and colored wash design for three-piece silver tea service
by Benda, George R.
New York, 1890. 1 vols. Image 12 x 21 inches; matted and framed to 19 x 28 inches overall. Framed and glazed. 1 vols. Image 12 x 21 inches; matted and framed to 19 x 28 inches overall. George R. Benda worked in New York at the end of the 19th century; he specialized in designs in silver, many for the noted firm of Black, Starr & Frost - Gorham, for whom he may have made this elegant rendering.
Offered by James Cummins Bookseller.
Western Wheel Works Bicycle Manufacturers, Chicago U.S.A.
by Western Wheel Works
Chicago: Western Wheel Works / Office & Works Wells, Schiller, Siegel Sts & N. Park Ave, 1893. Very Good. Chicago: Western Wheel Works / Office & Works Wells, Schiller, Siegel Sts & N. Park Ave, 1893. First Edition. Tall octavo. 32pp. Illustrations throughout. Illustrated stapled wraps. Chips and creasing to edges with a few tears; general smudging. Split at top of front wrap along spine; brief loss near top staple, binding else sound and interior unmarked. Includes illustrations and descriptions for the Blackhawk, Escort, and Juno models, among others; final 10 pages full of descriptions and illustrations for parts for each model. A neat little production published the same year as the Chicago World's Fair. We locate a single holding in OCLC at the University of Michigan, and later catalogs specifically for "Crescent Bicycles" from the same firm are only slightly more plentiful.
Offered by Capitol Hill Books.
by WILSON, Harry Leon
New York: Cosmopolitan, 1923. Hardcover. Near Fine/Very Good. First edition. Near fine in about very good dust jacket with rubbing and some creased tears on the rear panel. Basis for two films: a 1925 silent version directed by Harry A. Pollard and featuring Reginald Denny and Mary Astor; and a 1937 version directed by Ray McCarey and featuring Edward Everett Horton, Donrue Leighton, and Eve Arden. Scarce in jacket.
Offered by Between the Covers Rare Books.
The Art of Railroading or the Technique of Modern Transportation. (8 volumes)
Chicago.: Railway Publications Society., 1906 - 1908. Original half black leather over marbled boards, gilt spine titles, marbled edges.. Very good, light shelfwear, blacked-out numbers on the upper corner of the title pages, folding frontis of volume 1 detached but present.. 22x15x39 cm.. A scarce monumental treatise on railroading at the end of the golden age of American railroads. Heavy set, may require extra shipping. weight: 20.5 lb. Numerous illustrations, many of which are fold-outs.
Offered by Lee Johnson's Zephyr Books.
East of the Sun, West of the Moon
by [Asbjornsen, Peter Christen] and [Moe, Jorgen Engebretsen]; Nielsen, Kay [Illustrations]
[London]: Hodder & Stoughton, 1914. First Edition. Hardcover. Very good. Nielsen, Kay. First trade edition, quarto size, 207 pp. Kay Rasmus Nielsen (1886-1957), was born in Denmark hearing the traditional Norse fairy tales related by his mother, studied art in Paris, and moved to London in1911. His artwork brought immediate critical acclaim with his first illustrated book, "In Powder and Crinoline" being published in 1913.
However, it was this work, "East of the Sun, West of the Moon", which, "y general consent, [is his] most spectacular and celebrated." One of his admirers, Martin Birnbaum, wrote of this book: "His most intricate inventions never seem laboured. Controlled in a measure by Norse ornamental traditions, he reaches an absolute equality with the poetical text..." (Dalby, p. 90).
Nielsen's style was heavily influenced by Japanese art, and his artwork "unite[s] strong linearity with delicate colouring. For example, the heroine of 'Prince Lindworm'...kneels in a perfect arc of physiologically impossible grace before a tree whose weeping branches echo her curves." (Zipes, p. 341).
Sadly, Nielsen's later years were marked with poverty, as his artwork was no longer in demand after WWII. If only he could know what a great gift his talents have given, and what joy his art has brought to so many.
DESCRIPTION: Bound in dark blue cloth over boards, gilt lettering and elaborate designs on the front panel and spine, richly decorated endpapers by Nielsen in black and gold, illustrated and bordered title page in black, lettered tissue-guarded frontispiece one of twenty-five full colour illustrations bound in throughout, each tipped at the gutter edge onto heavy paper with borders of black and gold, in addition to the colour illustrations there are numerous black-and-white line in-text line drawings and decorations on every page, with each story opening with a three-line initial capital; binding is quarto size (11 3/8" by 9"), pagination: [i, title page with blank verso] [1-8] 9-205 [206].
CONDITION: Very good overall, the boards clean, we had a professional (name available upon request) restore the joints and some damage to the spine and corners, the volume is now sturdily bound, the hinges are solid, the inside is clean other than two leaves with some offsetting from something laid in at some point in the past (not affecting any illustrations), and the sole prior owner marking we see a name lightly written at the top of the front free endpaper; the front board slightly bowed and some soil on the bottom edge of the text block. Overall a near fine interior with a good, but now sturdy, binding.
Offered by Swan's Fine Books.
ELIZABETH BENNET; OR, PRIDE AND PREJUDICE
by Austen, Jane; [Rébora, Sol]
Philadelphia: Carey & Lea, 1832. First printing. Near fine.. First US edition in a stunning fine art binding by the acclaimed Argentinian design bookbinder Sol Rébora. Austen's most beloved novel is simultaneously a unique production of profound artistic confidence and an entertaining popular love story: it builds on a long-established tradition of English courtship novels in conversation with many women authors before her like Frances Burney (from whose book CECILIA Austen may have borrowed the very phrase "pride and prejudice"). Austen admitted in a letter that she thought her book's heroine, Elizabeth Bennett, "as delightful a creature as ever appeared in print" (29 January 1813) – and generations of readers have agreed with her. First published in 1813 in three volumes, this is the first edition to appear in the United States, published in two volumes by Carey & Lea in an edition of only 750 copies.
Sol Rébora is an internationally recognized design bookbinder based in Buenos Aires. Her works embody a minimalistic elegance that is nevertheless subtly complex, as in the carefully structured multiple layers used here. They are not only visually stunning, but supremely tactile. From Rèbora's artist statement: "The cloth texture is achieved using silk with a patterned design that evokes the aesthetic of the time period in which the original edition was produced, creating a visual connection with antique paper. This design also appeals to the collective memory of how custom bindings from the early 19th century might have appeared, complete with deep-relief hot-stamping impressions." A magnificent, unique copy of an Austen first. Two 12mo volumes, 6.75'' x 4.25'' each. Modern full peach design binding by Sol Rébora in Can Can structure with one layer of cotton cloth and two layers of Japanese paper, each element hand-painted with acrylics and textured with a patterned design impressed with deep-relief hot-stamping from silk; spines and boards stamped in dark grey. Cotton and abaca handmade paper peach endpapers. Publisher's catalogue bound at front of Vol. I. 199, [1]; 209, [1] pages. Vol. I with early pencil inscription of the Portsmouth Athenaeum to fly leaf; early newspaper clipping on "Jane Austen's Genius" archivally tipped onto rear fly leaf. Some browning, light staining to text block, a few early marginal pencil notes. Bright.
Offered by Type Punch Matrix.
by Tolkien, J. R. R.
Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1938. First American edition. Near Fine/Good +. A Near Fine copy of the first American printing of this iconic work of imaginative fiction. Bowing Hobbit on the title page and misprint at Chapter VII (as required for the first printing), complete with the four color plates and numerous black and white illustrations. Boards only minimally toned/soiled, very slight loss at the upper corner of the text block (possibly nibbled?), but free of previous ownership markings and likely unread. In a Good example of the scarce first American dust jacket. Jacket price-clipped and with loss along the top of the front panel and at the crown. Despite the defects, a relatively attractive and unrestored example.
The Hobbit follows the exploits of Bilbo Baggins as he joins a company of Dwarves set on retaking their former kingdom from the dragon Smaug. A brilliant piece of writing, for any genre. The book has now been translated into fifty languages and sold a hundred million copies worldwide. "Though all is marvelous, nothing is arbitrary: all the inhabitants of Wilderland seem to have the same unquestionable right to their existence as those of our own world, though the fortunate child who meets them will have no notion—and his unlearned elders not much more—of the deep sources in our blood and tradition from which they spring." (C. S. Lewis for the Times Literary Supplement, Oct., 1937). Near Fine in Good + dust jacket.
Offered by Whitmore Rare Books.
by SCHMIED, FRANÇOIS-LOUIS, Illustrator. (BINDINGS - MIREILLE MAGNIN). SUETONIUS
Paris: F.-L. Schmied, 1928. No. 57 OF 175 COPIES, SIGNED BY SCHMIED. 290 x 193 mm. (11 1/2 x 7 1/2"). 4 p.l., 8, CCCXXVI [i.e., 326] pp., [4] leaves.
BOLD CONTEMPORARY ART DECO RED MOROCCO, GILT AND INLAID, BY MIREILLE MAGNIN (stamp-signed on front turn-in), covers decorated with multiple gilt and inlaind black morocco lines, inspired by the original printed covers (bound in here) and title page designed by Schmied, title inlaid in balck morocco on upper cover, smooth spine with gilt lettering, turn-ins with gilt rules and inlaid black morocco striped, red and gilt marbled endleaves, top edge gilt, other edges untrimmed. In a (slightly soiled) fleece-lined, leather-lipped slipcase. With decorative title and section titles printed in gold, and 23 COLOR ILLUSTRATIONS BY SCHMIED, comprised of nine vignette tailpieces, and 14 full-page plates, including 12 portraits. Front flyleaf with morocco armorial bookplate of Léopold Carteret. Ritchie 26. Black morocco strips on spine just a shade lighter than those on covers, otherwise a virtually pristine copy.
Providing aesthetic pleasure inside and out, this is the Carteret copy, in a very appealing Art Deco binding, of the beautifully illustrated Schmied livre d'artiste version of Suetonius' classic biographies of the first 12 Roman emperors. Immensely talented in all areas of book production, François-Louis Schmied (1873-1941) was one of the most important, original, and active figures in the world of artists' books. He was born and studied in Geneva, moved to Paris at 22 to make a living as a wood engraver, and joined the French Foreign Legion in his mid-40s, losing an eye in the Great War. It was after 1919 that Schmied began to focus primarily on the production of "éditions de luxe," and in the mid-1920s, he and his eldest son Théo managed an atelier that issued a distinguished series of sumptuous works in very small editions, largely for members of elite French bibliophile societies. The illustrations in the present volume place statue-like emperors in front of geometric, stage set-like backgrounds awash with patterns and the kind of muted, warm colors typical of Schmied illustrations. The binding by Mireille Magnin is careful and precise, with the crisp linear motifs matching those on the section titles within the book. Mireille was the daughter of Marius Magnin, who was known for his meticulous mosaic bindings. She joined the family workshop in the 1920s, and ran it until her retirement in 1961. The Roman biographer Suetonius (69-140?) wrote a considerable number of biographies as well as works on antiquities, natural science, and even linguistics, but all that have survived are his "Lives of Famous Men" (in part) and the present "Lives of the 12 Caesars," originally written in 121 A.D. Containing biographies of the Roman rulers from Julius Caesar through Domitian, it has remained of enduring interest mainly because of its material relating to the emperors' often scandalous private lives. Our copy is from the library of bookseller, publisher, and bibliographer Léopold Carteret (1873-1948). As one of the most prominent bibliophiles in Paris, he was called upon to provide expertise for numerous auctions, including the notable Henri Béraldi sale of 1934.
Offered by Phillip J. Pirages Rare Books.
by George Lucas (director, screenwriter); Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Peter Cushing, Alec Guinness (starring)
N.p.: N.p., 1977. Collection of 25 vintage borderless reference photographs from the 1977 film, including 23 matte-finish and 2 glossy. Several with manuscript pencil annotations to the verso, noting the film's title in French ("La Guerre des Etoiles").
The film that became a multibillion dollar media empire (pun intended), now including eleven additional live action films, animated shows, novels, comic books, video games, and countless tons of officially licensed merchandise, with no signs of slowing down. Winner of six Academy Awards and nominated for four more, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Supporting Actor for Alec Guinness.
Set a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, shot on location in California, Arizona, Mexico, Guatemala, Tunisia, and the UK.
Three photographs 10 x 8 inches, 22 photographs 9.5 x 7 inches. Near Fine.
Offered by Royal Books.
by JUDSON, Clara Ingram
Chicago and New York: Rand McNally & Company, 1923. Frances BEEM. [JUVENILE] [WOMAN AUTHOR] [WOMAN ILLUSTRATOR]. Frances BEEM, illustrator. First edition. 12mo; 72pp; red cloth over board, pictorial onlay on front board of a cottage in the woods with animals, black lettering on spine; gift inscription on ffep; color fp; vignette of a running mouse on title page; 7 full-page color illustrations + b&w illustrations throughout text; unclipped color pictorial dust jacket lacking price, publisher’s ad for other Judson books on rear panel, rear flap ads for Child Life magazine, chipping to edges with loss; fine in very good dj. Scarce; OCLC locates only 7 copies of this first edition. A little book for children about garden creatures during wintertime. This lovely story features anthropomorphic animals and teaches children how the animals find food and shelter. Rare in the dust jacket.
Clara Ingram Judson (1879-1960) was an American writer of children’s books, mainly non-fiction, with over 70 titles published. Frances Beem (1881-1971) was an American illustrator of children’s books and a high school teacher who won awards for her watercolors.
Offered by Sandra L. Hoekstra.
by PERRAULT, Charles
Amsterdam: Chez Jaques Desbordes, 1708. Full Description:
PERRAULT, Charles. Histoires ou Contes du Tems Passe. Avec des Moralitez Par le Fils de Monsieur Perreaul. de l'Academie Francois. Amsterdam: Chez Jaques Desbordes, 1708.
A very early rare edition of the "Mother Goose" fairy tales of Charles Perrault which is an exact reprint of the Dutch counterfeit published the same year as the first edition of Paris, 1697. Twelvemo (4 5/8 x 2 13/16 inches; 119 x 71 mm). [6], 175, [1, table] pp. With engraved frontispiece, title-page vignette, engraved head-and-tail-pieces and initials, and with eight engraved vignettes, one for each tale. Besides this copy, we could only find one other copy at auction in the past 40 years.
This edition features the eight tales found in the first edition, each illustrated with a vignette: Sleeping Beauty, Little Red Riding Hood, Bluebeard, Puss in Boots, The Fairies, Cinderella, Riquet with the Tuft, and Tom Thumb.
Beautifully bound by M. Godillot in full tan morocco. Boards triple-ruled in gilt. Spine elaborately stamped and lettered in gilt. Gilt dentelles. Marbled endpapers. All edges gilt. Top margin occasionally trimmed close, just touching headline. Previous owner's bookplate on front free endpaper. Housed in a morocco lined, marbled paper slipcase. About fine.
"The title gives the author as the Son of Monsieur Perrault of the Academie François [sic], as in the 1697 forgery. The dedication to Mademoiselle is signed P. Darmancour. In fact, the participation in the writing of the Tales of Perrault's youngest son, Pierre Perrault Darmancour (1678-1700), is now attested."
According to Alde, "This edition is extremely rare; it is missing from the BnF and all French public libraries. Tchemerzine mentions it without having seen it, according to Brunet's supplement, who himself only cites it from Baron Pichon's catalog (1869, I, no. 766: "Rare Edition," a red morocco copy by Trautz-Bauzonnet, acquired for 145 francs by Techener). It was not included in the collection of the Count of Lignerolles, who nevertheless owned eleven editions of the Tales published between 1697 and 1781 (1894, II, nos. 1911-1921)."
Offered by Heritage Book Shop.
by Nabokov, Vladimir
Paris: Olympia Press, 1959 Two volumes. First edition, fourth printing. Publisher's original green wrappers, printed in black and white. Near fine set, with light wear to edges of Vol. II wrappers including a small closed tear to right edge of front wrapper, a light scratch to rear wrapper of Vol. II, and "New Price" stamp to rear wrapper of Vol. I and a couple of other faint stamp marks to wrappers of both volumes. Overall, an attractive set, with very clean pages. A controversial novel due to its racy subject matter, Lolita tells the story of Humbert Humbert, a professor of literature with a penchant for pre-teen "nymphets." Specifically, Nabokov chronicles the unstable narrator's romantic interest in Dolores Haze, the daughter of his landlord and wife, whom he privately nicknames "Lolita." Lolita was first published in 1955 as part of Olympia Press' Traveller's Companion series, which included other literary classics like Henry Miller's Quiet Days in Clichy (1956) and William S. Burroughs' The Naked Lunch (1959). The Olympia Press was well known for its liberal selection of literature; many English-speaking authors published their books with Olympia in Paris after being rejected by other publishing houses. Notably, in 1962, Lolita was adapted into a film by Stanley Kubrick starring Sue Lyon and James Mason.. First edition, Fourth Printing. Soft Cover. Near Fine.
Offered by B&B Rare Books.
by POTTER, Beatrix
Philadelphia: Henry Altemus Company, 1904. First American Printing of Peter Rabbit In the Original Printed Dust Jacket.
POTTER, Beatrix. The Tale of Peter Rabbit. Altemus' Wee Books for Wee Folks. Thirty-one Illustrations. Philadelphia: Henry Altemus Company, 1904. First American edition, first printing. Sixteenmo. [3]-127, [3, blank] pp., including thirty-one color plates after the designs by Potter. With black and white rabbit vignette on half-title.
Original green cloth, cover stamped pictorially in black, white, blue, and red, spine and front cover lettered in red. Beige and white pictorial endpapers, not of Potter's design. Original beige dust jacket, printed in black, with Altemus ad on back panel, Peter Rabbit picture and lettering on front, and "Altemus' Wee Books for Wee Folks No. 3" lettered on spine. Jacket chipped at spine extremities, with slight loss, and very lightly browned. Small and inoffensive stain on rear free-endpaper. With a Christmas, 1904 ink inscription on half-title "'Merry Christmas'/for /Agnessita/from Aunty Jane/1904". A wonderful copy of this juvenile classic in the exceptionally rare dust jacket. Housed in a black cloth clamshell case.
"When Frederick Warne first published Peter Rabbit in London [in 1902], they sent a few copies to their firm in New York where, due to a misunderstanding, they were unfortunately sold before copyright was properly obtained. And for that reason the copyright for the book remains to this day in 'public domain' in the United States" (Quinby, p. 18). Altemus was the first to take advantage of this situation, copying the text and illustrations from Warne and issuing in 1904 not only the first pirated edition, but also the first edition printed in America. This edition was reprinted for several years without changing the date on the title-page; consequently, the 1904 inscription is the only sure way of identifying the first printing.
Quinby 2c. Linder, p. 109. V&A 1640 (fourth printing only).
Offered by David Brass Rare Books.
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