Books, manuscripts, maps and ephemera at auction had been performing exceptionally well through 2018 with $609,830,918 of sales and then the 2019 market further increased with $725,695,460. Yes, there were some disturbing reports in Asia and the US western states during the last few months that a health crisis could be brewing but nothing was certain until February 11th 2020 when Covid entered our lexicon. But plans are hard to make and even harder to break, and there wasn’t any consensus that the yet-to-be-understood illness would be a game changer. So the ABAA kept to their plan to host...
Historic wrongs are impossible to undo. The past cannot be changed, only the future can be made better. A recent story from Rocky Mountain PBS highlights a case that ties to books in a most unpleas...
Kurt Zimmerman began writing his popular blog American Book Collecting in 2011. In the next eleven years he focused on topics of interest to those in the book trade and the world of collecting. “I...
The Brooklyn Public Library is celebrating its 125th anniversary, so you can be sure a lot of books have been borrowed from their collections. They looked back on that and created a list of the 125...
The history of Hong Kong has been interwoven with economic and social genius, among those who have had it, the Hotung Family whose many generations have created significant collections of the fines...
If there were hopes that the conclusion of the recent election cycle would bring an end to the recent rash of book banning and censorship attempts at libraries, it turns out not to be so easy. The ...
The book banning epidemic took a turn for the worse when one library tried to deal with the issue by providing some twisted form of balance. The Wake County (North Carolina) Public Libraries have h...
The 19th Century Rare Book and Photograph Shop offers in its Catalogue 195 a collection of 60 books, manuscripts, and photographs representing humankind’s greatest achievements. Highlights include:...
Not only do black holes reconcile the quantum theory with the force of gravity, but they also make science and religious books agree on one (black) matter: all is vanity.
I was enjoying a lit...
The highlight of Christie’s December Books Manuscripts auction is the first 110 lots: the Collection of a Lady being sold to benefit Historic Deerfield. The collector acquired these books and manu...
By Ian Ehling
Director, Fine Books Manuscripts
Bonhams New York
In his autobiography The World of Yesterday, Stefan Zweig describes his interest in collecting manuscripts: “The one thing tha...
Leland Little, the North Carolina auction house at 620 Cornerstone Court, Hillsborough, has composed an eclectic sale of highly curated lots that, for those who are prepared to reward themselves, t...
The Philadelphia Rare Book Fair is set to take place Thursday, December 8, through Saturday, December 10. The Philadelphia fair has drawn 25 booksellers from across the eastern states to exhibit. N...
There have been several stories of books that have disappeared from a collection finally making their way home recently. Those are happy ending stories, and these days, we all need some cheer. So h...
“His treatise pioneered the development of modern sciences, forever changing the way that mankind looked at the nature of life.1” He would be Charles Darwin and his treatise was On the Origin of Sp...
For December, we review 12 new bookseller catalogues as the holiday season heats up with new offerings. For those interested in travels as they were in another time, Shapero Rare Books has a catalo...
Sotheby’s, July 14: Henry De La Beche. "Awful Changes," 1830. $6,000 to $9,000.
Sotheby’s, July 15: [Apollo 11]. Flight Plan, Complete Original Printing Signed by Buzz Aldrin. $5,000 to $8,000.
Sotheby’s, July 15: Thomas Alva Edison. Documents Establishing and Ending the Edison Electric Railway Company. $20,000 to $30,000.
Sotheby’s, July 15: Richard P. Feynman. Feynman's Lectures on Gravitation 1-16, Including the Original Transcriptions of Lectures 12-16 by Morinigo and Wagner, With Richard Feynman's Manuscript Notations, 1971. $12,000 to $18,000.
Sotheby’s, July 15: [Apollo 9]. A Group of Manuals and Mission Documents used by Stuart Roosa as a member of the Astronaut Support Crew. $5,000 to $8,000.
Sotheby’s, July 15: [BYTE: The Small Systems Journal]. A collection of early foundational issues of Byte: The Small Systems Journal, with rare hardcover editions. $5,000 to $8,000.
Forum Auctions The 10th Anniversary Sale Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper July 16, 2026
Forum, July 16: Inundation papyrus. P.Michael 4, the ‘Inundation papyrus’, a geographical account of the Nile near Canopus, in Greek, remains of two columns from a manuscript scroll on papyrus, Egypt, second century CE. £12,000-18,000
Forum, July 16: Book of Hours, use of Sarum, manuscript on vellum, 6 full-page miniatures, with famous Middle English inscriptions, Southern Netherlands for the English market, [c.1430]. £30,000-50,000
Forum, July 16: Qu'ran, Arabic manuscript on burnished, stencilled, and gold-flecked paper, 447ff., Sultanate Gujarat, Ahmadabad, [after 1411 but no later than 1442]. £15,000-20,000
Forum Auctions The 10th Anniversary Sale Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper July 16, 2026
Forum, July 16: Turner (William). A New boke of the natures and properties of all wines that are commonly vsed here in England, rare first edition of the first English book on wine, By William Seres, 1568. £20,000-£30,000
Forum, July 16: Spenser (Edmund). The Faerie Queene. first edition, Printed [by John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, 1590. £30,000-40,000
Forum, July 16: Shakespeare (William). The Comedie of Errors, extracted from the first folio, Isaac Jaggard and Edward Blount, 1623. £15,000-20,000
Forum Auctions The 10th Anniversary Sale Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper July 16, 2026
Forum, July 16: Fleming (Ian). Casino Royale, first edition, signed presentation inscription from the author, 1953. £40,000-60,000
Forum, July 16: d'Agoty (Jacques-Fabien Gautier). Anatomie de la Tête, first edition, Paris, chez le Sieur Gautier, 1748. £10,000-15,000
Forum, July 16: Martial Arts.- Lee (Bruce). 'Praying Mantis style' Kung Fu book, containing numerous annotations, diagrams and graphs in Bruce Lee's hand, c. 1960. £50,000-70,000
Forum Auctions The 10th Anniversary Sale Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper July 16, 2026
Forum, July 16: Warre (Capt. Henry James). Sketches in North America and the Oregon Territory, first edition, rare hand-coloured issue, 1848. £30,000-40,000
Forum, July 16: Norie (John William). The Marine Atlas, or Seaman's Complete Pilot for all the principal places in the known world..., 1826. £30,000-50,000
Forum, July 16: Mao Tse-tung.- Kim Il-sung.-[Note book for visitors from China to Korea], signed by Mao and Kim, [Beijing, 1954]. £10,000-15,000
