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Dear Friend,
Annotated books have long been our obsession here, which explains this month's offering of a collection of 30 titles, each helping to tell the story of readers' interactions with these most fascinating of human artifacts. Further down you can find Royal cartes de visite, a manuscript account of a 19th century tour of the Bodleian Library, and pioneering sexology from the 1930s.
Best wishes,
Christian White
MARKS IN BOOKS - 1703-1977 - A Collection of 30 Annotated Books — Many and Varied Authors — 1703
30 high quality books from nearly 3 centuries, annotated by their writers and readers including an American Presidential biography annotated by the subject’s mother; a British Prime Minister’s school text; dramatic prompt copies, review copies, books annotated for radio adaptation, a massively corrected proof by a popular novelist, an opera annotated by a leading tenor and books owned and annotated by writers such as Laurie Lee, Noel Coward and George Mackay Brown. (PLEASE REQUEST A FULL CATALOG…… Read more
FOREEDGE PAPER LABEL - England’s Reformation — Thomas Ward — 1715
Single volume with a rare surviving foreedge label. Bound in contemporary panelled calf, red speckled edges. Just the second volume of 2 but with a foreedge label written on paper which is attached to a p17 so as to sit outside the book as a means of identifying the title. No other sign of ownership apart from a pencilled press-mark on the first flyleaf. An attractive bibliographical curiosity.… Read more
THREE DISCOURSES ON ETERNITY — Job Orton — 1786
Unrecorded ‘sixth edition’ of Orton’s study of eternity. Small duodecimo format most attractively bound in black morocco with gilt decoration to the spine.Marbled endpapers, early inscription on second flyleaf: ‘W.I. to Mary Taylor’; title page with woodcut decoration. The book collates complete, similarly to other known editions: x pp11-139 [5]; closed tear across A5, otherwise an unmarked copy with the advertisement for Eddowes’ Shrewbury imprints on the final pages. Orton (1717-1783) Orton wa…… Read more
4 RARE BROADSIDES in an Album of ‘Varieties’ — William Hodgson — 1790-1820
Collection with a strong Yorkshire flavour which incorporates rare and unrecorded broadsides including an unrecorded ‘Weather Table’ from Ripon, a copy letter containing an account of the brutal suppression of the Wexford Rebellion of 1798 and engravings of Captain Cook’s Third Voyage. Small folio volume (26x34cm) bound in remnants of half calf over marble paper-covered boards with ‘Varieties’ on a printed label to the upper board. Spine perished and both boards detached. Bookplate of William Ho…… Read more
THE PRACTICE OF COOKERY, Pastry, Confectionary, Pickling and Preserving with Directions for Choosing Provisions — Mrs Frazer — 1800
Uncommon third edition of this Edinburgh-printed cookbook with a strongly Scottish flavour. Rebound in plain dark calf during the twentieth century and with new endpapers. The two engravings precede the text, both browned and a couple of short marginal tears. The second plate has lost the top corner near the foreedge - not affecting the image. The book collates complete: xvi, pp270. An attractive copy.… Read more
Letters to Bermuda - VICTORIAN CROSS-WRITING — Henrietta and Fanny Ward — 1845
Two cross-written manuscript letters penned in October 1845, to Edward Ward Esquire, Royal Engineers, Bermuda, one from his sister Henrietta, the second from Fanny Ward, both living at 114, Champs Elysees, Paris. Each letter is 9 ⅞ x 15 inches (approx 25 x 38 cm), written on both sides, bearing both red postage payment stamps and blue ‘St. James St’ stamps and the instruction ‘By Halifax Mail’ indicating the Cunard mail service route. Both letters bear remains of seals. While Fanny’s letter of 3…… Read more
10 ROYAL CARTES DE VISITE - Queen Victoria; Prince Albert and their Children — London Photographers — 1855
Album collection of Carte de Visite of Queen Victorian and Prince Albert from the 1850s as well as the future Edward VII and Queen Victoria’s other children in photographs from the 1860s and 1870s. Green cloth bound album with clasp and blind stamping (11.5x14cm) with shiny white shot-silk effect card endpapers. The albumen photographic carte de visite are window mounted (5x8.5cm) and all are removable if preferred. The 10 royal images precede 8 private family photographs, mostly by Suffolk-base…… Read more
CHANNEL ISLANDS Key to the Ceremony of Laying the First Stone of the New Harbour, Saint Peter-Port, Guernsey — [George Reynolds] — 1855
Printed engraving on paper, laid down on folding linen which was issued alongside George S Reynolds coloured lithograph of this auspicious occasion. 8 folding panels with line image above and 316 names below; a little dustiness. Contained within its original textured cloth covered binding. A scarce and attractive survival.… Read more
MANUSCRIPT ACCOUNT OF A TOUR OF THE BODLEIAN LIBRARY — Edith Caroline Taylor, later Methold [daughter of] Alfred Swaine Taylor — 1858-1874
Diaries and Commonplace books of Edith Caroline Taylor which includes a an account of viewing the Anglo Saxon chronicle overseen by Bodley’s librarian, Henry Coxe. Edith Taylor, born 1844, was the daughter of the well-connected English toxicologist and medical writer Alfred Swaine Taylor; she went on to marry Frederick Methold and lived in Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk. This collection dates from her teens and early twenties when she was caught up in her father’s intellectual social circles in Lond…… Read more
CARTES DE VISITE Mr and Mrs ‘General Tom Thumb’ — Charles D Fredricks and Co — 1863
2 Cartes de Visite of Charles Sherwood Stratton and Lavinia Warren (61x102m) with the imprint of Charles D Fredrick, & Co “Specialite,’ 587b Broadway, New York to the verso. A little rubbing to both images but near fine condition. Stratton achieved great success under the impresario P T Barnum and married his fellow circus performer Lavinia Warren in 1863, around the time of these photographs.… Read more
POCKET PLEDGE BOOK OF THE TEMPERANCE MOVEMENT - Band of Hope Declaration — Wesleyan Methodist Church — 1879
Rare collection of 98 signed temperance ‘pledge’ certificates collected in Lincolnshire in the 1870s. Small (16.5x7cm) pre-printed pledge book; remnants of covers still attached to text block by leather straps. Each certificate exists in two parts; one signed off by the Temperance member and a stub containing their details. Only a handful of certificates have been torn off as would have been expected but, happily for us, the remaining 90 or so are present. Most names are male and most individual…… Read more
THE HENRY IRVING Dream of Eugene Aram — F Drummond Niblett; Thomas Hood — 1887
Beautifully printed caricatures of the great actor of his day, Sir Henry Irving, illustrating his favourite recitation, Thomas Hood's 'The Dream of Eugene Aram’. 24 unnumbered pages printed red on black; near fine condition. A testament to the quality of print work possible in the late 19th century. Uncommon in trade.
ARMOUR EXHIBITION Catalogue of the Loan Exhibition at the Brassey Institute March 16th 1896 — F R Fairbank — 1896
Ex Royal Armouries copy from the F H Cripps-Day bequest. Contemporary cloth binding; ‘Tower Armouries Ex Lib...’ stamp crossed out and annotated by librarian ‘Duplicate not required...’ Ownership inscription of F H Cripps Day 1920, Kent antiquarian, opposite. Browning to endpapers. Written on the title page: ‘First Edition with the secretarys compliments’. A mixture of text and military brass rubbings as plates, pp118. Extra-illustrated and with expert annotation from Cripps Day.
INTERACTIVE CHILDREN’S BOOK RECORDING ‘MISDEEDS’ - Forfeits of My Friends — Hennessy family of Rye & Artist Edward Burra — 1913
Scarce (1 institutional copy at Cambridge) elaborately annotated children’s book signed by the young artist, Edward Burra. Green decorative cloth, inscribed by ‘Aileen Hennessy 1917’ on the front pastedown; unpaginated; with the printed direction to ‘Choose a page, fill in the misdeed for which you are about to pay forfeit. Sign your name, then tear open the upper leaf at the line... and pay the penalty....’ Around 25 manuscript entries from the Hennessy family of Cognac fame who lived at Saltco…… Read more
PIONEERING SEXOLOGY - Sex Efficiency through Exercises: Physical Culture — Theodore H Van de Velde — 1933
A pioneering work on the physical culture that supports women’s sexual pleasure, fertility and childbirth with 480 photographic flicker cards. Bound in shiny blue cloth with gilt lettering in very good plus condition and with the 'Cinematographic Supplement' present and in excellent condition. Collates: xviii, pp 164 with 54 half tone photographic plates. Van de Velde proposed that his exercises would assist 'women and those who help them (whether as doctors, midwives, nurses and gymnastic instr…… Read more
WARTIME POSTCARDS TO A LANCASHIRE CHILD — Waxman Family — 1941
53 wartime colour postcards - many of flower fairies and fairy-tale characters sent to Valerie Waxman of 23 King Street, Southport, Lancashire from ‘Daddy’ and other close relatives. 36 typed cards, 16 hand-written, one blank; the typed cards mostly seemingly enclosed in letters, without stamp, postmark or date. Cards in good condition with light soiling; some creasing. ‘Daddy’, Gersh, evidently travelled with his employment or war work and wrotes home encouragingly, but often hoping he will hav…… Read more
‘SHORT BOOK ON THE HIPPY REVOLT’ - Letters to a Publisher — Colin Wilson, John Wynne-Tyson, Michael Byrom, (EH Visiak) — 1958, 1969-1970
Fascinating exchange of letters between ‘Angry Young Man’ Colin Wilson, Michael Byrom (1 letter), and the publisher Jon Wynne-Tyson (1924-2020) of Centaur Press renown (9 items); together with a typed 40-page essay by Colin Wilson entitled ‘Homage to E.H Visiak’. The collection includes 3 letters on Wilson’s own headed paper (rubber stamped); 2 headed, typed postcards; 2 letter envelopes, 1 C5 envelope. The Wilson/Byrom letter is out of sequence with the others, dating from 12 years earlier, and…… Read more
THE BALKAN TRILOGY - The Great Fortune; The Spoilt City; Friends and Heroes, (The Balkan Trilogy) — Olivia Manning — 1960
Three first editions of Olivia Manning's Balkan Trilogy. The Great Fortune is very good, a little spine lean, in a near very good jacket with a scar to the spine and tape marks on the front and rear flaps; The Spoilt City is very good in a near very good price clipped jacket with rubbing to the extremities; Friends and Heroes is near fine in a very good jacket. An attractive triogy of these novels set in 1930s Bucharest which found new popularity in the 1990s through the TV adaptation starring K…… Read more
THE AUTHOR’S COPY - A History of Printing in Britain — Colin Clair — 1965
The author Colin Clair’s retained copy with readers’ letters, reviews and the book’s prospectus laid in. Very good first edition in a very good jacket. Tipped onto the front pastedown is the TLS review with a letter to Clair about the book from Proust’s biographer George Painter taped opposite. Occasional corrective annotation by Clair to the text as well as, laid in, numerous reviews and letters - from William Lefanu at the Royal College of Surgeons, Desmond Flower from Cassell, the book’s publ…… Read more
GREAT TRAVEL WRITING - A Time of Gifts, Between the Woods and the Water [SIGNED], The Broken Road — Patrick Leigh Fermor — 1977
Three first editions - the second, Between the Woods and the Water signed - of Patrick Leigh Fermor’s account of his epic walk to Constantinople. All three books are first editions in their jackets. A Time of Gifts is very good plus in blue publisher's boards, with an gift insciption to the front flyleaf and a postcard laid in. Unclipped jacket; a little creasing to the head and tail of the spine. Between the Woods and the Water is fine in a near fine jacket, signed by Patrick Leigh Fermor on th…… Read more
WITH A BOOKPLATE SIGNED BY ANTHONY BURGESS - A Clockwork Orange — Anthony Burgess — 1982
Anthony Burgess's cult novel signed on a bookplate by the author in black ink - and mounted in the book on the first blank. (Burgess signed this bookplate for Waterstones in the 1980s.) This 1982 reprint is near fine, pages clean and crisp; in a near very good jacket, rubbed and creased to the edges, short closed tear to the top of the front panel on the hinge with the spine. A very attractive copy of a novel that matters.
SENSATION - Young British Artists from the Saatchi Collection — Royal Academy — 1997
Catalogue for the exhibition that kickstarted the Brit Art phenomenon. Printed on a single sheet, front and back, folded into four panels; 8 pages with work illustrated by Damien Hirst, Rachel Whiteread and the Chapman Brothers.… Read more
SIGNED BY DESCENDANTS OF FLETCHER CHRISTIAN - Pitcairn Island Refuge of the Bounty Mutineers — Maurice Allward — 2000
Signed by 5 descendants of Fletcher Christian and Edward Young and a further 54 attendees of the Bounty Pitcairn Conference, in Florida, 2005. The book which was owned by its author Maurice Allward is presented here in its original binding, with the logo of the conference tipped onto the front cover. Overleaf are 5 long inscriptions written by Pitcairn islanders such as ‘Greetings from Tom Christian M.B.E. Great Great Great Grandson of Fletcher Christian Leader of the Mutineers of H.M.S. Bounty…… Read more
Dr. Christian White
Christian White Rare Books
287 Leeds Road, Ilkley, LS29 8LL
07811 455398
info@christianwhiterarebooks.com
www.christianwhiterarebooks.com
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