Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies … the Second Impression. London: Printed by Tho. Cotes, for Robert Allot, 1632

This is an excellent example of the Second Folio, the second edition of Shakespeare’s collected plays. This is “incomparably the most important work in the English language” (Jackson, Pforzheimer Catalogue).

$475,000

Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World . . . by Lemuel Gulliver. London: Benj. Motte, 1726

FIRST EDITION. This is a handsome set of Teerink’s A edition, the true first edition.

$75,000

A Dictionary of the English Language. London: W. Strahan for J. & P. Knapton, 1755

First edition of this enduring classic of English literature. This is Johnson’s “audacious attempt to tame his unruly native tongue … combining huge erudition with a steely wit and remarkable clarity of thought” (Hitchings).

$65,000

Autograph letter signed to Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Camden, New Jersey, 9 August 1878

“The Good Gray Poet” to the Poet Laureate. Tennyson was the most important of of the many English literary figures who subscribed to the “Author’s Edition” of Leaves of Grass, privately issued by Whitman in 1876. Hearing that Whitman was “in great straits, almost starving,” Tennyson sent him five pounds virtually as an outright gift, rather than the more modest subscription price (Kaplan, Walt Whitman).

Please inquire

Autograph letter signed to Miss Thurston. No place, [c. 1868 or possibly later]

Louisa May Alcott discusses the impact of Little Women and its place in children’s literature. She observes that “My ‘Little Women’ have much astonished their Momma by making many friends for themselves, & she can only account for it by the grain of truth that lay at the bottom of the little story.”

$45,000

Flowers from My Garden. Sketched and Painted from Nature. [New York], [1864]

FIRST EDITION, a unique pre-publication copy with 18 fine watercolors, the original art used as the basis for the lithographs in the published edition.

$37,500

A Tale of Two Cities. London: Chapman and Hall, 1859

FIRST EDITION, FIRST BINDING, FIRST PRINTING (with page 213 mis-numbered 113 and sig. b present on the list of illustrations, points that were corrected in later copies of this edition).

$35,000

Tender is the Night. New York: Scribner’s, 1934

FIRST EDITION, the extremely rare advance issue in wrappers.

$35,000

The Lord of the Rings. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1954-1955

FIRST EDITIONS, FIRST PRINTINGS. This is a very attractive set of the celebrated Lord of the Rings trilogy. The size of the edition was small: The Fellowship of the Ring (3000 copies), The Two Towers (3250 copies), and The Return of the King (7000 copies).

$35,000

“By the Pond” autograph manuscript. No place, August 22, 1877

Whitman reflects rapturously on his time alone by a remote pond. Dipping his pen in the brook, he looks around and marvels, “nothing could be more primitive, secluded, naturally free, cool, luxuriant than the scene I am in the midst of.”

$35,000