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Book Price Guide
UK First Edition, First Impression, published in 1937. Original Cloth, Hard Back, First state dust jacket.
First edition with "First published in 1937" on the copyright page and all 16 misprints called-for in the Hammond and Anderson bibliography. Octavo. 310 pages plus two-page Overleaf / advertisement, the latter of which lists two Capek titles and one by Huxley. Jacket illustration, both endpapers, frontispiece, and internal illustrations by the author.
Publisher's green cloth with dark blue decorative stamping and titles designed by the author. First state dust jacket with "Dodgson" misspelled as "Dodgeson" on the back flap (the "e" has been blacked out by the publisher).
Like A. A. Milne before him and many authors before and since, Tolkien began his famous story of Bilbo Baggins and his wizard friend Gandalf as a storytime tale for the children he loved. His eldest sons remember elements of the story being told to them in the family's Oxford study as far back as 1929, a fact the author seems to confirm in a 1955 letter to W. H. Auden: "All I can remember about the start of The Hobbit is sitting correcting School Certificate papers in the everlasting weariness of that annual task forced on impecunious academics with children. On a blank leaf [of one of the student papers] I scrawled: 'In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.' I did not and do not know why. I did nothing about it, for a long time, and for some years I got no further than the production of Thror's Map. But it became The Hobbit in the early 1930s..."
"Bilbo Baggins was a hobbit who lived in his hobbit-hole and never went for adventures, at last Gandalf the wizard and his dwarves perswaded [sic] him to go. He had a very exiting [sic] time fighting goblins and wargs. At last they got to the lonley [sic] mountain; Smaug, the dragon who gawreds [sic] it is killed and after a terrific battle with the goblins he returned home - rich! This book, with the help of maps, does not need any illustrations it is good and should appeal to all children between the ages of 5 and 9." Rayner Unwin, age 10, son of publisher Stanley Unwin, in a reader's report to his father dated October 30, 1936. Partially upon the basis of this report, Allen & Unwin became publishers of The Hobbit, as Stanley Unwin believed "the best judges of children's books were children." A rich and culturally significant relationship thus began between author and publisher that would continue through The Lord of the Rings and for years beyond.
Wayne G. Hammond and Douglas A. Anderson: J. R. R. Tolkien: A Descriptive Bibliography, A3a. Humphrey Carpenter: J. R. R. Tolkien: A Biography (2000 edition), page 184
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Big Little Book Price Guide
From the novel by Edward Eggleston. Fictionized by Edward Finney. Movie photo edition. With Norman Foster, Charlotte Henry, Tommy Bupp.
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Book Price Guide
Author's first book. First edition, first printing with matching dates of 1972 on the title and copyright pages as well as no subsequent printings mentioned on the copyright. With "Printed in Great Britain by Bristol Typesetting Co., Ltd. Barton Manor, St. Philips, Bristol." at the bottom of the copyright page. Octavo. 413 pages with full-color fold-out map at end. First Edition
Original tan cloth binding with gilt lettering at spine and gilt illustration on recto board.
Watership Down is the first and most successful novel by the British author, Richard Adams. It is a heroic fantasy about a small group of rabbits who live in their natural environment, but are anthropomorphised possessing their own culture, language (Lapine), proverbs, poetry and mythology. Evoking epic themes, the novel recounts the rabbits' odyssey as they escape the destruction of their warren to seek a place in which to establish a new home, encountering perils and temptations along the way. The novel takes its name from the rabbits' destination Watership Down a hill in the north of the county of Hampshire near the area where Adams grew up. The story is based on a collection of tales that Adams told to his young children to pass the time on trips to the countryside. Adams's descriptions of wild rabbit behaviour were much influenced by The Private Life of the Rabbit, by British naturalist Ronald Lockley. Though it was initially rejected by thirteen publishers, Watership Down has never been out of print and was the recipient of several prestigious awards. Adapted into an acclaimed classic film and a TV series it is Penguin Books’ best-selling novel of all time.
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Book Price Guide
4 volumes, "double-elephant" broadsheets (979/975 x 650/632 mm). Engraved title-page in each volume and 435 hand-colored, etched and aquatint plates, by William H. Lizars (Edinburgh), Robert Havell, Sr. and Robert Havell, Jr. (London), after Audubon's original life-size watercolor drawings, on J. Whatman and J. Whatman Turkey Mill paper with watermarks dated 1827-1838.
First state of the title in volume I, containing 13 lines (before the addition of two extra lines listing Audubon's memberships to learned societies and without volume number). The plates in this set are arranged in order of publication (not by families) and numbered I-X, 11-14, XV, 16-100, CI-CCCCXXXV. Thus, most of the first 100 plates (Vol. I) are early states with Arabic numbering. All of the first ten plates are engraved by William Home Lizars alone, before retouching by R. Havell, Jr.
Two paper stocks were used throughout the production, both bearing the name of the English paper-maker James Whatman. William Balston, the apprentice and successor of the younger James Whatman, shared the rights to the old Whatman company and used the watermark "J Whatman"; the Hollingsworth family had the rights to the watermark "J Whatman Turkey Mill." The sheet size of the paper is known as "double elephant," measuring 39 x 29 inches, approximately the same size of the drawing paper that bears the same name.
Size: 993 x 655 mm (39 1/8 x 25 inches). Full contemporary English crimson morocco, richly gilt, covers paneled a wide decorative roll-tooled outer border surrounding a central panel with a roll-tooled border, a stylized scallop corner-piece built up of smaller tools at each outer corner of central panel, spines in nine compartments with eight double-raised bands, two with onlaid green morocco lettering pieces, the others with a repeated richly gilt panel, board edges and turn-ins elaborately gilt, marbled paper pastedowns and free endpapers, blank flyleaves watermarked "J. Whatman 1838," stamp-signed "J. Mackenzie" on free endpapers of plate volumes (Vol. 3 with a tiny stain on fore-edge, some slight areas of darker discoloration partially due to orientation of the leather hides, some minor surface wear and abrasions skillfully restored and refurbished by James & Stuart Brockman Ltd.); plate volumes in four velvet-lined quarter leather buckram over wooden board folding boxes.
As a subscription publication, The Birds of America was issued over a decade according to demand, and the plates bear a range of imprints, which varies from set to set. We know that Robert senior died in 1832 and that Robert junior then styled himself R. Havell. Fries cites the variants in the names on the first ten plates, which are likely to cause the most confusion as they were the ones engraved by Lizars. They were handed over to the Havells as soon as they had been engaged for the project, and the imprint was amended to reflect this. The earliest states of plate I have "Engraved by W.H. Lizars Edinr.", while later states have "Retouched by R. Havell Junr." Although Havell junior engraved all the plates after number 10, there is no evidence to support a conclusion from the final variants of plates III, IV, V and X, that Havell completely re-engraved the plates, despite the removal of Lizars name from the imprint. Some plates bear no distinction between the senior and junior Havells. Others mention Lizars engraving, but Havell senior printing and coloring (e.g. plate VII), or Robert junior retouching and Robert senior printing and coloring (see Appendix B for imprints on the plates in the present set).
EDITION SIZE AND RARITY
Although the final list of subscribers to The Birds of America totaled 161, a somewhat greater number of sets certainly was produced. Bibliographers of the double-elephant folio have calculated the edition size at approximately 200 completed copies. In her updating of Fries' 1973 census, Susanne Low writes, "119 complete copies are known to exist in the world today. 108 are in institutions such as universities, libraries, museums, athenaeums, societies, and the like. 11 are in private hands."
Since 1973, 24 copies of the book have been sold at auction. Of these, 14 have been sold on a sheet-by-sheet basis, many of these lacking plates, and are dispersed (including the Earl of Carnarvon copy comprising 159 plates only), and another incomplete set which lacked volume IV was sold together but presumably is now dispersed (the Buffalo Society of Natural Sciences copy). At the present time, 107 copies remain in institutions and 13 are in private hands (which includes the Fox-Bute copy, previously unaccounted for by Fries and Low).
PROVENANCE
Presumably purchased sometime after 1838 as a bound complete set, by William Henry Cavendish Cavendish-Scott-Bentinck, 4th Duke of Portland PC, FRS, FSA (24 June 1768 - 27 March 1854), styled Marquess of Titchfield until 1809. He was a British politician who served in various positions in the governments of George Canning and Lord Goderich. Portland was the eldest son of Prime Minister William Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland and Lady Dorothy, daughter of William Cavendish, 4th Duke of Devonshire and Charlotte Boyle, Baroness Clifford. He was the elder brother of Lord William Bentinck and Lord Charles Bentinck. He was educated at Westminster School and Christ Church, Oxford.
Each volume in this set contains the armorial bookplate of the 6th Duke of Portland. However, according to the keepers at Welbeck, there seems to be little consistency of the "bookplating" in the library. There are many volumes presently in the library without any bookplate at all, as well as many books acquired by the 4th Duke with no earlier bookplate than the 6th Duke's on their pastedowns. Other books in the library that are known to have been purchased by the 4th Duke show his serious interest in natural history, and therefore may indicate he was the original purchaser of this Audubon set soon after publication in 1838 and prior to his death in 1854. It is possibly, however, that this set may also have been purchased later by the 5th or 6th Dukes of Portland, the son of the 4th Duke and his cousin, respectively.
William John Cavendish Cavendish-Scott-Bentick, 5th Duke of Portland (1800-1879), styled Lord William Cavendish-Scott-Bentick before 1824 and Marquess of Titchfield between 1824 and 1854, was a British aristocratic eccentric who preferred to live in seclusion. On 27 March 1854 he succeeded his father as 5th Duke of Portland. He had an underground maze excavated under his estate at Welbeck Abbey, near Clumber Park in North Nottinghamshire, where he kept his library.
William John Arthur Charles James Cavendish-Bentick, 6th Duke of Portland (1857-1943), known as William Cavendish-Bentick until 1879, was a British landowner, courtier and Conservative politician. He notably served as Master of the Horse between 1886 and 1892 and again between 1895 and 1905. He inherited the Cavendish-Bentick estates, based around Welbeck Abbey, from his cousin William Cavendish-Scott-Bentick, 5th Duke of Portland, in 1879.
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Book Price Guide
Octavo. 318 pages. Original pictorial dust jacket. Five inserted plates by J. Allen St. John. Publisher's blue cloth with red titles. Top edge red.
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Big Little Book Price Guide
Original Pop-Up Book with 3 Pop-Ups and dated 1935. By Lt. Dick Calkins and Phil Nowlan. WARNING: Not to be confused with the 1994 reprint.
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Big Little Book Price Guide
Movie photo cover and scenes. Retold by Eleanor Packer and illustrated with scenes from the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer production. Based on the original story by John Monk Saunders.
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Book Price Guide
First edition, first issue in the first issue first state dust jacket with the reading "Katharine Barclay" in the blurb on the front flap. Octavo. Original black cloth, printed gold labels to spine and upper board. One of 510 numbered copies signed by the author.
First state of text without disclaimer and earliest state of dustwrapper with "Katherine Barclay" reading
The original dustjacket shall have the $2.50 price present and the first issue point with "Sun Also Rises" and "Men without Women" titles listed on back panel of the dustjacket.
"[Hemingway’s] first full-length novel and probably his best, closely rivaled by To Have and Have Not. Its success was so enormous that it may be said to have ended Hemingway’s influence as a writer. After it one could no more imitate that musical crystal-clear style; blown like glass from the white-heat of violence" (Cyril Connolly, The Modern Movement, 60).
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Big Little Book Price Guide
190 Authentic Photographs - a pictorial history of the battles in Europe, Asia, and Africa, in the air and on the seas. Arranged and edited by Otto Kurth. Inspired by Laurence Stellings' famous collection of war pictures.
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Book Price Guide
First edition, first printing, with "Published May, 1936" on copyright page and no note of other printings. In first issue dust jacket with Gone with the Wind listed in the second column of Macmillan Spring Novels list on rear panel. Octavo. 1037 pages. Original gray cloth decoratively stamped and lettered in blue on front cover and spine.
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Big Little Book Price Guide
By Edgar Rice Burroughs. Illustrated with Scenes from the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Production starring Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O'Sullivan.
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Big Little Book Price Guide
By Grace Mack. Pictures supplied through the courtesy of Fox Film Corporation and Paramount Studio. Movie photo covers and interiors.
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Book Price Guide
First Edition not stated. Original pictorial dust jacket, art by Stanley Burroughs.
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Big Little Book Price Guide
From the RKO Radio Picture starring Harry Carey and Hoot Gibson. Adapted from a story by William Colt MacDonald. Movie photo edition.
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Big Little Book Price Guide
Softcover. Movie photo edition starring Jack Hulbert. Illustrations from the photoplay by Guy Bolton. A Gaumont-British Production.
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Book Price Guide
First edition, second issue, with "Published June, 1936" on copyright page; in the second issue dust jacket, with "$3.00" price in lower corner of front flap and with "Gone with the Wind" in first column on rear panel. Octavo. 1037 pages. Original gray cloth decoratively stamped and lettered in blue on front cover and spine.
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Book Price Guide
First American edition, first printing. Octavo. 429 pages. Publisher's original beige boards and matching cloth backstrip with titles in gilt on the spine. Full numberline on copyright page with 1 present.
Jacket priced at $6.95 at the front flap, first issue with British reviews on the rear panel with a rabbit and compass illustration at the top, author's photo at the rear flap, shelf wear at the edges, darkening at the jacket spine, spots on the jacket, tear at the head of the front panel.
Beware of later printing with 1974 date on copyright page, these are worth a fraction of true first printing's price.
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Big Little Book Price Guide
From the screenplay by Karl Brown and Robert D. Andrews. A Monogram picture starring Jackie Cooper, with Robert Warwick and Lucy Gilman. Movie photo edition.
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Big Little Book Price Guide
Title Page states "Story Of Moby Dick." Adapted from the Novel by Herman Melville. Illustrated with Scenes from "The Sea Beast." Warner Brothers movie photo edition.
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Big Little Book Price Guide
Double-sized with four pop-ups, 9 3/4" x 7 1/2". Containing "Babes In The Woods" and "King Neptune." Stories and Illustrations by the Staff of Walt Disney Studios.
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Book Price Guide
First British edition, first printing with "First Printing 1944" opposite title page.
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Big Little Book Price Guide
From the Movie Serial. Based on the famous comic strip character by Chester Gould. Retold from the Republic Motion Picture. Movie photos throughout.
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Big Little Book Price Guide
Starring Johnny Mack Brown and Noah Beery. Adapted from the Motion Picture Story "Fighting With Kit Carson." Novelized by Charles T. Clinton. A Mascot Picture. Photo cover and photos throughout.
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