By Bruce McKinney
Book collectors have come to expect at least one book fair in San Francisco during the January-February period. Every two years the ABAA brings its west coast show to San Francisco during this period but this is the off-year. Their tents this month are pitched in Los Angeles. Fortunately there is a San Francisco book fair that is put on every year. It is the San Francisco Antiquarian Book, Print Paper Fair and it recently was held at Fort Mason along the water off of Lombard Street Saturday and Sunday January 31st and February 1st. It’s a good show because it is...
By Karen Wright
John Dunning is a very successful mystery writer, former bookseller, former investigative reporter, writing instructor, and old-time radio aficionado, among his other vast talents....
by Carl Burnham
Austin, Texas
In the beginning, the Internet was a boring place. A place for hobbyists and geeks, and university types, to send text messages amongst themselves. Flash was o...
Zebulon Vance of North Carolina was another southern unionist who held out until the end. Elected to Congress in 1860, this message To the Citizens of the Eighth Congressional District of North Car...
By Michael Stillman
“There is a moral in an autograph. Man’s earthly life is limited to the span of three score and ten, but all his acts have upon them the stamp of immortality, and even in th...
By Michael Stillman
The William Reese Company has issued its catalogue number 229, “Voyages and Travels.” Offered are 174 rare books, manuscripts, and illustrations pertaining to the early voya...
By Michael Stillman
From Charles Wood Bookseller comes his latest catalogue, and we can already see that, years from now, people will be collecting variants of this item. On the cover it is cal...
By Michael Stillman
The written word and photograph are two different means of presenting an image. Paul M. Hertzmann, Inc., and Margolis Moss have combined to offer a catalogue of books that ...
By Renée Magriel Roberts
Cape Cod, Harwich Port. About a year ago I was selling a very hard-to-find copy of Britt-Mari Näsström’s Freyja, Goddess of the North to a customer and found the book —...
By Bruce McKinney
The term book search engine would seem to be a generic term. To a layman this is a piece of software that searches your expressed criteria in the more than 25 book listing site...
By Bruce McKinney
It’s 5:05 am on a Sunday morning and I’m up early to review the auctions on eBay I’m bidding at today. The material I’m focusing on only came to my attention during the past ...
ALDE, Apr. 8: GUEVARA (ANTONIO DE). Histoire de Marc-Aurèle, Empereur Romain, vray miroir et horloge des Princes. Paris, Pierre et Galliot du Pré, frères, 1565. €3,000 to €4,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: HEURES DE LA VIERGE. Horæ in laudem beatissimæ virginis Mariæ ad usum Romanum. Paris, Charles L'Angelier, 1556. €4,000 to €5,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: MONTAIGNE (MICHEL DE). Les Essais. Édition nouvelle, trouvée après le deceds de l'autheur… Paris, Abel L'Angelier, 1595. €6,000 to €8,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: [ROJAS (FERNANDO DE)]. Celestina, tragicomedia di Calisto et Melibea, tradotta de lingua castigliana in italiano idioma… Venise, 1531. €2,000 to €3,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: CAMÕES (LUÍS DE). Os Lusiadas. Lisbonne, Pedro Crasbeeck, 1613. €2,000 to €3,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: CERVANTES (MIGUEL DE). El Ingenioso hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha. Bruxelles, Roger Velpius & Huberto Antonio, 1611. €6,000 to €8,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: LA FONTAINE (JEAN DE). Fables choisies, mises en vers. Paris, Denys Thierry et Claude Barbin, 1678-1694. €6,000 to €8,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: CERVANTES (MIGUEL DE). El Ingenioso hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha. Madrid, Joaquin Ibarra, 1780. €3,000 to €4,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: DIDEROT (DENIS) ET JEAN LE ROND D'ALEMBERT. Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers. Paris, 1751-1765. €15,000 to €20,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: [LIVRE TISSÉ]. LAMARTINE (Alphonse de). Les Laboureurs. Poème tiré de Jocelyn… Lyon, J. A. Henry, 1883. €8,000 to €10,000.
ALDE, Apr. 8: [LIVRE TISSÉ]. Livre de prières tissé d'après les enluminures des manuscrits du XIVe au XVIe siècle. Lyon, [A. Roux], 1886. €5,000 to €6,000.
Sotheby’s Books, Manuscripts & Objects from Three Important Collections Open for Bidding 2-17 April
Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: [Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun]. Le Roman de la Rose, [Geneva or Lyons, c.1481], first printed edition of the most important medieval French vernacular poem. £200,000 to £300,000.
Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: Castiglione. Il libro del cortegiano. [Venice], April 1528, first edition, in a magnificent binding by Jean Picard for Jean Grolier. £100,000 to £150,000.
Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: Jacobus de Cessolis. Schachzabelbuch, Strasbourg, 1483, von der Lasa copy. £50,000 to £70,000.
Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: World Championship, 1972. A collection of 84 press photographs of the famed match between Spassky and Fischer. £2,000 to £3,000.
Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: Ben Franklin. Autograph letter signed, to Lord Shelburne, British Prime Minister, during peace negotiations, November 1782. £15,000 to £20,000.