Shop — page 3 of 48

Rare printed collection of heartfelt mid 19th century poetry written by an aristocratic woman and printed to a remarkably high standard by an otherwise almost unknown provincial press new Newcastle. DESCRIPTION: Large quarto format (22x28cm) bound in ribbed red cloth with gilt decoration; a few marks to boards but very good; all edges gilt. Vibrant… Read more…

Three works that form part of the outpouring of commentary and mourning that followed the execution of Charles I in January 1649. The most famous of these works, Eikon Basilike appears first but lacks its portrait. The third text in the work, the Apophthegms, may be the version that appeared alongside this edition of the Eikon. Between the two impr… Read more…

Considered and reflective of a full artistic life, a potted manuscript autobiography, titled ‘Reflections’ written by the painter, engraver and printer Lucien Pissarro. Written across two sheets of paper, Pissarro praises his impressionist painter father as ‘a splendid teacher, never imposing his personality on his pupils’ who ‘made me work direct… Read more…

Otherwise unknown London chapbook edition of this outrageous and transgressive eighteenth century novel. PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Small format bound in blue stamped cloth over bevel-edged boards. Title in faded gilt to the upper cover and spine with the (surely very high?) price of 7s 6d. Edges of text block stained red. Paper lining to inner hinges;… Read more…

Two unrecorded anti-slavery pamphlets addressing the forced migration of labourers from the Polynesian islands and of so-called ‘coolie emigration’ from ‘French West Indian and South American possessions’ to British India. These otherwise unknown texts have been bound alongside two classic British pamphleteering texts attacking American slavery, du… Read more…

Rare book binding displaying Jessie M King’s blue and green paisley pattern batik silk. One of the most influential artists of her time, King (1875-1949) introduced the wax-dye technique of batik into Scotland, and though she has become most celebrated for her illustration work King also created jewellery, ceramics and, as here, fabric. King’s wrap… Read more…

Rare, illustrated late Victorian chapbook-adjacent edition of one of the most prosecuted and banned books in history. Publisher’s black textured cloth with the title to the upper board. Backstrip appears to have been relaid. Coloured frontispiece opposite title page which has the bookseller’s stamp of ‘Dorsan and Co’ of West Norwood in south London… Read more…

Richly provenanced Nelson family association copy presented by Horatio Nelson’s niece Charlotte Nelson to the future Admiral Richard Crozier. Two handsome small octavo volumes bound in straight grain red morocco with gilt decoration; all edges gilt; grey coated endpapers. Armorial bookplate of Richard Crozier to both front paste-downs. Charlotte Ho… Read more…

Three seemingly unrecorded New-Year’s messages written by John Ruskin and other grandees for students in Aberdeen. Dated respectively 1873, 1874 & 1878, within each issue Ruskin has offered his new year message in letter form. The volume is housed within a hinged clam shell box containing the bookplate of ‘JM’ - John Morgan of Rubislaw House, a mas… Read more…

Four volume 18th century edition in attractive speckled calf whose first owner in the 1780s was Mary Tunstall, subsequently given to her cousin, Maria Salvin. Uniformly bound with gilt spine band and a red morocco spine label. A little tenderness to upper hinge of volume I but otherwise a very good set of bindings which are also very attractive. In… Read more…

First separate edition of Cicero's Verrine orations with Giunta’s preface addressed to Tommaso Pighinucci. A little sequence of early ownership signatures on the first flyleaf take us back to 17th century Venice, the earliest from 1621; then from the town of Gorizia: ‘Andreas de Thomasinis Goritia Dolce ingano d'amor cossanon voglie’ and a later in… Read more…

Architectural drawings and designs for Chelsea Hospital by Clerk of the Works Sir John Soane who is the signatory to several of the letters and reports within this volume of parliamentary publications. DESCRIPTION: Tall folio within vibrantly marbled boards in very good condition. Endpapers, additional blank leaves, papers and drawings bound within… Read more…

A fairy drama preceded by a long dissertation by the author ‘On Fairies’, the Scottish Language and Pastoral. Handsomely bound in half dark green morocco over marbled boards. Frontispiece of the Falls by R Scot; engraved title to the play drawn by J Burnet and engraved by R Scott: pp241. A lovely copy. In the early 19th century, fairies, or Sìthich… Read more…

Four page setting of Feste’s song ‘Come Away, Death’ from Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. Written over four oblong octavo pages (a bifolium extracted from a book of printed manuscript paper) with prettily embossed borders. Neukomm sets the music for a low voice over two verses and with a keyboard accompaniment that introduces and ends his setting. At… Read more…

First US Edition inscribed to the bookbinder Alfred de Sauty, then working in Chicago, and bearing De Sauty’s drawing ‘Sketched at Field Museums (Chicago) from S American specimens of human head reduced by special treatment’ - the type of exhibit found in the collection belonging to the novel’s protagonist, the criminal anthropologist, Humphrey Cha… Read more…

Scarce first edition recording through 26 letters a journey from London to Edinburgh & Glasgow via Yorkshire and Northumberland on the journey North and returning via Cumberland, Westmoreland and Lancashire. About two thirds of the book is devoted to describing Edinburgh, Glasgow and the Scottish lowlands. Written by an opinionated, educated but un… Read more…

Sketch book crammed with full page, double page and smaller vignettes of daily life captured throughout the artist’s travels in Central America, the locations sketched and painted include: Main Street, St Thomas in the Virgin Islands, Puerto Cabello in Venezuela, Puntarenas in Costa Rica (5 pp. coastal scenes), Acajutla in El Salvador, Mazatlan, Le… Read more…

Far eastern sketch book recording the artist’s response to the urban and rural landscapes of Malaysia, Taiwan, Japan and Singapore. Attwell paints Penang alongside vignettes of a Sikh driver and orchids, monkeys in Singapore, a Shengshui New Territories street scene, house and shrine in Moji, Old Street in Kyoto, Shrine in Nagoya (words for railway… Read more…

Presentation copy inscribed by Benson to ‘J.N.D. from the author ACB July 1892 No. 80/200’. J.N.D. seems certain to be John Neale Dalton (1839-1901) for whom he served as best man in 1886. Benson wrote in his diary of the older man that "Dalton showed me much fatherly kindness" while Dalton described Benson as "an object of adoration". Published at… Read more…

Owned and annotated by John Maynard Keynes’ social reformer mother, Florence Ada Keynes, an early graduate of Newnham College, Cambridge. Acquired from a great nephew of the author, the book is initialled ‘F.A.K.’ on the half title in pencil; Keynes senior has tipped in a portrait of Robert Malthus opposite the chapter devoted to the economist whic… Read more…

First Edition in very good condition in very good dust jacket with the author’s original 138 pp. autograph manuscript of the first 5 chapters of the novel which was made into a movie in 1963 by Metro Goldwyn starring Jane Fonda, Peter Finch, and Angela Lansbury. PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Blue cloth boards, endpapers and text block in very good conditio… Read more…

Negotiations with Scotland over the future of Charles I, first printed in 1646 for Edward Husband, collated and complete. DESCRIPTION: In very good condition in a very pleasing, later half binding of brown calf over very lightly rubbed marbled boards. Titled in gilt over red ground to the spine; very lightly bumped to corners; endpapers clean; a li… Read more…

Two of the artist’s earliest self-portraits, created while he studied at the school and published here in the school magazine, The Bradfordian. Hockney’s cartoon-style self-portraits appear in the March 1953 issue (235), both signed in print ‘Okni’ and depict the young David protesting ‘about Compulsory Running’; in the second image opposite he is… Read more…

Delicious almanac with watercolour-illustrated boards of the gardens of what became Napoleon Bonaparte’s principal residence, with silk pockets and an unused set of reusable weekly cards for appointments. (10x6.5cm), watercolours of the Cascades of the Chateau de Saint-Cloud mounted behind glass, front and back - one image looking up the cascade, t… Read more…

A remarkable and mystical unpublished short story written in April 1898 by a young woman called ‘Ecila’ - presumably a reversal of her actual name, Alice - which presents as a sort of adolescent fever dream in which the young woman is led through a mystical landscape, distracted by Sensuality and finally arrives at a vision of the Goddess Truth. Th… Read more…