By Bruce McKinney
Material is given to libraries for many reasons. Often the owner has or had a preference for an institution and in time this preference leads to a gift. Such gifts, if substantial, may be legally executed. Most are less formal. When the gift is legally structured, it includes obligations that in time expire. For all other gifts, often subject only to a holding period for tax purposes, the institution is free to catalog or dispose or catalog and later dispose.
Within libraries there are two views as to how such material should be treated once an institution's leg...
By Bruce McKinney
At Bloomsbury New York on December 3rd the hammer will fall on a single owner sale, a small group of exceptional early printed books and other items relating to the new world I...
By Bruce McKinney
The history of libraries and rare books came to San Francisco in the person of Terry Belanger to deliver a talk at the California Book Club on Monday evening, October 5th. Sev...
By Michael Stillman
The proposed settlement that would allow Google to offer digital copies of copyrighted books, and in particular so-called "orphan books," books that are out of print and thei...
By Michael Stillman
The prices of electronic book readers are tumbling, sales are increasing, and intense competition is boiling just below the surface. The electronic book reader market is stil...
By Michael Stillman
We are at a moment of momentous change in the book industry. Where it all will play out remains anyone's guess. All we know is that it will soon be very different from what w...
Book Clubs and Events a new page, is now linked throughout the site. On the home page, on the menu under the sign-in box [but no sign-in required], there's now the link Shows, Clubs, other. On th...
By Michael Stillman
For generations, rare book libraries have been obtaining and squirreling away enormous quantities of historic old books and ephemera. They have made them available to bona fi...
By Bruce McKinney
Two sales this year by libraries in the United States illustrate how procedure may influence public response when material is deaccessioned. The two libraries are the Wilmingt...
By Michael Stillman
A recent unsold auction lot is something of a microcosm of various challenges facing the book trade today. It was a single item, though not an ordinary book. It was a set of ...
By Michael Stillman
UCLA's Clark Library was the recipient of a major Shakespeare collection. Valued at just under $2 million, it is the largest gift ever received by UCLA's rare book library. I...
By Bruce McKinney
The Book Club of California held its annual reorganization meeting on Wednesday, October 20th in new space under renovation quarters at 312 Sutter Street in San Francisco. I w...
By Michael Stillman
Freedom to navigate the seas is a crucial element of free trade among nations. For many, their very survival requires freedom of trade, yet this freedom was not always recogn...
This month we review 15 new book catalogues. Travel is the topic at Bernard J. Shapero Rare Books and Gert Jan Bestebreurtje Rare Books. A particular trip, Cook's last voyage, is the subject at Hor...
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.
