Peter Harrington has released a new catalogue in their "50" series, this one being Fifty Books and Manuscripts. These are not just any 50 books and manuscripts (mostly books). These are some of the most important books written. They cover diverse categories from fiction, poetry, history, religion, even children's books. It is their significance and desirability that is the common thread. Here are a few examples of what we mean.
We begin with an account of the real pirates of the Caribbean by one of the few of them who actually wrote a book (most pirates weren't particularly literat...
This month we received our first catalogue from Librairie Michel Bouvier. Michel Bouvier has been in the trade for 40 years and operates in a most traditional, and perhaps today unusual way. Librai...
John Windle Antiquarian Bookseller has issued Catalogue 64. It begins with 10 items from their new William Blake Gallery in San Francisco. They explain. "The William Blake Gallery is the first gall...
Phillip J. Pirages Fine Books and Manuscripts published a selection of Some Books, Illuminated Manuscripts, and Single Manuscript and Printed Leaves To Be Exhibited at the 49th California Internati...
The George S. MacManus Company has issued their Catalogue 414 Travels & Explorations Part III. While there is no limitation expressed as to the nature of these journeys, we can say that they ar...
Sotheran's (Henry Sotheran Ltd.) has released a catalogue of Highlights. Two Hundred years of bookselling in London 1816-2016. Since the firm began in London in '16 and this is the year '16, it con...
L & T Respess Books has issued List 303: Americana. There is not much that needs to be said to describe what is here despite just a single-word title. There is a heavy concentration of 19th and...
The Brick Row Book Shop has issued their Miscellany Seventy: Recent Acquisitions for Winter 2016. This is certainly a miscellany, more specific descriptive words hard to find. There is a lot of ant...
Hordern House has issued a catalogue of The New World, East Indies & Asia: Voyages of Exploration, 1558-1889. It is filled with travel accounts, generally on the Pacific side of the globe. Hord...
Douglas Stewart Fine Books recently prepared a catalogue for the California Book Fairs 2016. Stewart made the journey across the Pacific from Australia with some special items for American collecto...
Gene W. Baade Books on the West has issued their latest catalogue of western wear – Catalogue 216. This land, bigger than life, where myth intersects with reality at some unknown point, remai...
Bernard and Stéphane Clavreuil of Librairie Thomas-Scheler published a selection of Rare Books for the 49th California International Antiquarian Book Fair. These would be special books, wort...
Aleph-Bet Books has released their Catalogue 112 of Children's Books & Illustrated Books. Aleph-Bet's catalogues are always a treat. Every item, and there are over 500, is illustrated in color,...
Lorne Bair Rare Books has issued Catalog 23 Radical & Social Movement Graphics. Or perhaps, based on the cover, we can call it Think. Lorne Bair specializes in material related to social moveme...
The William Reese Company has prepared their Bulletin 41 Original Works of American Art. We don't ordinarily write about catalogues of art, but there are several reasons why this one is appropriate...
Swann, May 15: Lot 4: Helena Bochoráková-Dittrichová, Z Mého Detství Drevoryty, Prague: Obzina, 1929. First trade edition, signed by the artist. $4,000 to $6,000.
Swann, May 15: Lot 10: Nancy Cunard, Negro Anthology, with a tipped-in A.L.S. to Karl Marx's niece, 1934. First edition. $3,000 to $5,000.
Swann, May 15: Lot 14: Margaret Fuller, Woman in the Nineteenth Century, 1845. First edition. $4,000 to $6,000.
Swann, May 15: Lot 17: Lorraine Hansberry, A Raisin in the Sun, inscribed first edition, 1959. $2,000 to $3,000.
Swann, May 15: Lot 28: Margaret Hill Morris, Private Journal Kept during a Portion of the Revolutionary War, for the Amusement of a Sister, 1836. First edition. $3,000 to $4,000.
Swann, May 15: Lot 38: Anna Sewell, Black Beauty: The Autobiography of a Horse, 1877. First edition. $3,000 to $5,000.
Swann, May 15: Lot 43: Gertrude Stein, Portrait of Mabel Dodge at the Villa Curonia, signed presentation copy with photograph of Stein, 1912. First edition. $8,000 to $12,000.
Swann, May 15: Lot 48: Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse, first edition in the scarce dust jacket, 1927. $6,000 to $8,000.
Swann, May 15: Lot 54: Katherine Dunham, large archive of material from her attorney, 1951-53. $20,000 to $30,000.
Swann, May 15: Lot 55: Margaret Fuller Signed Autograph Letter, New York City, 1846. $3,000 to $5,000.
Swann, May 15: Lot 92: Sonia Delaunay, illus. & Tristan Tzara, Juste Present, deluxe edition with original gouache, 1961. $20,000 to $25,000.
Swann, May 15: Lot 93: Flor Garduño, The Sonnets of Shakespeare, 2006. Limited edition. $6,000 to $8,000.
Sotheby's Sell Your Fine Books & Manuscripts
Sotheby’s: The Shem Tov Bible, 1312 | A Masterpiece from the Golden Age of Spain. Sold: 6,960,000 USD
Sotheby’s: Ten Commandments Tablet, 300-800 CE | One of humanity's earliest and most enduring moral codes. Sold: 5,040,000 USD
Sotheby’s: William Blake | Songs of Innocence and of Experience. Sold: 4,320,000 USD
Sotheby’s: The Declaration of Independence | The Holt printing, the only copy in private hands. Sold: 3,360,000 USD
Sotheby's Sell Your Fine Books & Manuscripts
Sotheby’s: Thomas Taylor | The original cover art for Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. Sold: 1,920,000 USD
Sotheby’s: Machiavelli | Il Principe, a previously unrecorded copy of the book where modern political thought began. Sold: 576,000 GBP
Sotheby’s: Leonardo da Vinci | Trattato della pittura, ca. 1639, a very fine pre-publication manuscript. Sold: 381,000 GBP
Sotheby’s: Henri Matisse | Jazz, Paris 1947, the complete portfolio. Sold: 312,000 EUR
Gonnelli Auction 59 Antique prints, paintings and maps May 20th 2025
Gonnelli: Pietro Aquila, Psyche and Proserpina,1690. Starting price 140€
Gonnelli: Jacques Gamelin, Memento homo quia pulvis es et in pulverem reverteris, 1779. Starting price 300€
Gonnelli: Giorgio Ghisi, The final Judgement, 1680. Starting price 480€
Gonnelli Auction 59 Antique prints, paintings and maps May 20th 2025
Gonnelli Goya y Lucientes Francisco, Los Proverbios.1877. Starting price 1000 €
Gonnelli: Domenico Peruzzini, Long bearded old man, 1660. Starting price 2200€
Gonnelli: Enea Vico, Leda and the Swan,1542. Starting price 140€
Gonnelli Auction 59 Antique prints, paintings and maps May 20th 2025
Gonnelli: Andrea Del Sarto [school of], San Giovanni Battista, 1570. Starting price 25000€
Gonnelli: Carlo Maratta, Virgin Mary and Jesus, 1660. Starting Price 1200€
Gonnelli: Louis Brion de La Tour, Sphére de Copernic Sphere de Ptolemée / Le Systême de Ptolemée. Le Systême de Ticho-Brahe…, 1766. Starting price 180€
Gonnelli Auction 59 Antique prints, paintings and maps May 20th 2025
Gonnelli: Marc’Antonio Dal Re, Ville di Delizia o Siano Palaggi Camparecci nello Stato di Milano Divise in Sei Tomi Con espressevi le Piante…, Tomo Primo, 1726. Starting price 7000€
Gonnelli: Katsushika Hokusai, Bird on a branch, 1843. Starting price 100€