Rare Book Monthly Articles - October - 2007 Issue

A Specialist Inventory to be Sold as a Single Lot at Auction

By Bruce McKinney On October 6th the remaining stock of Zobel Book Service, a specialist in scholarly and out-of-print materials, will be sold at auction in Kingston, New York by JMW Auction Gallery. The auction will be simulcast on eBay. Their entire 90,000 item inventory will be sold as a single lot. The opening bid will be $1,000 with no reserve. For 66 years Zobel has provided material to thousands of students, educators and collectors. The imprint dates span most of the 20th century. Almost every "ology" is represented. Psychology, sociology, education, some technical boo...

A Bookseller's Dream, A Book Seller's Nightmare

By Michael Stillman A story recently came out of England that brings an ethical issue no one in the book trade enjoys facing to the forefront. It is a story that may not have bad guys, but it ce...

A Strong October Auction Schedule

By Bruce McKinney If summer is a receding memory then the books, manuscripts and ephemera auction season must be upon us. A glance at the October auction calendar confirms it. As of September...

In The News: Burned Books, George Washington Baseball Cards, and the Alibris Nickel

By Michael Stillman Artist Charles Merrill recently announced that he had burned a valuable rare manuscript copy of the Koran. No stranger to controversy, Merrill had previously taken a pair of...

The Declining Value of Inventory

By Bruce McKinney In the biblical story of Noah and the ark the emphasis is always placed on the miracle of survival. A male and female of each animal are marched up into the boat to float for ...

Rose's Books and the Cistercians

by Renée Magriel Roberts As booksellers, we've certainly all experienced moments of serendipity -- the chance meeting that results in a wonderful buy or a still better sale, or the good luck of...

My “I have a dream” speech

By Bruce McKinney If you are looking for a reworking of Martin Luther King's speech in 1963 on the Washington D. C. Mall you are in for a surprise. It isn't that. It's much better. Through an...

What's Atop BookFinder's Top Ten This Year?

By Michael Stillman BookFinder has issued its annual report of Top Ten Lists of the most searched for books, and as always, they are a curious mix of the popular and the hard-to-find. There are...

A Book Fair in San Francisco in February 2008

By Bruce McKinney Every other year Walter Larsen Associates of Alameda, California, stage a San Francisco Antiquarian Book, Print, Paper Fair. In February, 2008, over the weekend of the 9th a...

Seattle Antiquarian Book Fair October 13th and 14th

By Bruce McKinney The Seattle Antiquarian Book Fair, the annual opportunity for book manuscript and ephemera dealers to visit Seattle in October to display wares, visit old customers and meet ne...

Book Review: Al Gore's <i>The Assault On Reason</i>

By Michael Stillman The latest book from environmental crusader and former Vice-President Al Gore, The Assault on Reason, is now on the shelves. Gore combines sharp insight, strong political vi...

<i>A Farewell to Alms</i> -- a book considered

By Bruce McKinney This is a brief economic history of the world with a focus on the Industrial Revolution. It is written by Dr. Gregory Clark. In it he offers a fresh perspective on re...

Fifteen Catalogues Reviewed In Section Two

This month we review fifteen new booksellers' catalogues in Section Two. Quite a few in the field of Americana recently arrived. David Lesser Antiquarian Books offers his 100th catalogue of rare Am...

Rare Book Monthly

  • Doyle, May 1: Thomas Jefferson expresses fears of "a war of extermination" in Saint-Dominigue. $40,000 to $60,000.
    Doyle, May 1: An exceptional presentation copy of Fitzgerald's last book, in the first issue dust jacket. $25,000 to $35,000.
    Doyle, May 1: The rare first signed edition of Dorian Gray. $15,000 to $25,000.
    Doyle, May 1: The Prayer Book of Jehan Bernachier. $10,000 to $15,000.
    Doyle, May 1: Van Dyck's Icones Principum Virorum Doctorum. $10,000 to $15,000.
    Doyle, May 1: The magnificent Cranach Hamlet in the deluxe binding by Dõrfner. $7,000 to $10,000.
    Doyle, May 1: A remarkable unpublished manuscript of a voyage to South America in 1759-1764. $3,000 to $5,000.
    Doyle, May 1: Bouchette's monumental and rare wall map of Lower Canada. $12,000 to $18,000.
    Doyle, May 1: An rare original 1837 abolitionist woodblock. $8,000 to $12,000.
    Doyle, May 1: An important manuscript breviary in Middle Dutch. $15,000 to $25,000.
    Doyle, May 1: An extraordinary Old Testament manuscript, circa 1250. $20,000 to $30,000.
  • Sotheby’s
    Modern First Editions
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Winston Churchill. The Second World War. Set of First-Edition Volumes. 6,000 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: A.A. Milne, Ernest H. Shepard. A Collection of The Pooh Books. Set of First-Editions. 18,600 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Salvador Dalí, Lewis Carroll. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Finely Bound and Signed Limited Edition. 15,000 USD
    Sotheby’s
    Modern First Editions
    Available for Immediate Purchase
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Ian Fleming. Live and Let Die. First Edition. 9,500 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter Series. Finely Bound First Printing Set of Complete Series. 5,650 USD
    Sotheby’s, Available Now: Ernest Hemingway. A Farewell to Arms. First Edition, First Printing. 4,200 USD
  • Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Isaac Newton on chemistry and matter, and alchemy, Autograph Manuscript, "A Key to Snyders," 3 pp, after 1674. $100,000 - $150,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Exceptionally rare first printing of Plato's Timaeus. Florence, 1484. $50,000 - $80,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: On the Philosophy of Self-Interest: Adam Smith's copy of Helvetius's De l'homme, Paris, 1773. $40,000 - $60,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: "Magical Calendar of Tycho Brahe" - very rare hermetic broadside. Engraved by Merian for De Bry. c.1618. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Author's presentation issue of Einstein's proof of Relativity, "Erklärung der Perihelbewegung des Merkur aus der allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie." 1915. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: First Latin edition of Maimonides' Guide for the Perplexed. Paris, 1520. $20,000 - $30,000.
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: De Broglie manuscript on the nature of matter in quantum physics, 3 pp, 1954. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Tesla autograph letter signed on electricty and electromagnetic theory. 1894. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Heinrich Hertz scientific manuscript on his mentor Hermann Von Helmholtz, 1891. $20,000 - $30,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: The greatest illustrated work in Alchemy: Micheal Maier's Atalanta Fugiens. Oppenheim, 1618. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Illustrated Alchemical manuscript, a Mysterium Magnum of the Rosicurcians, 18th-century. $30,000 - $50,000
    Bonhams, Apr. 28 – May 7: Rare Largest Paper Presentation Copy of Newton's Principia, London, 1726. The third and most influential edition. $60,000 - $90,000

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