Women Authors

Beatrix Potter

Deluxe edition, and first or second printing of The Tale of Mrs. Tittlemouse.<ul><li>Beatrix Potter (English).</li><li>London: Frederick Warne and Co., 1910.</li><li>Sextodecimo.</li><li>Color frontispiece, plain title vignette and 26 color plates, contemporary ink gift inscription dated Christmas 1910 to half-title.</li><li>Bound in publisher’s blue moiré cloth with fielded illustrative paste-down of Mrs. Tittlemouse, all edges gilt.</li><li>Custom-made solander box.</li></ul>

The Tale of Mrs. Tittlemouse

Charlotte Brontë | Emily Brontë | Anne Brontë

Finely bound set of the first printing of the Thornton edition of the novels of the Brontë sisters, which is considered the definitive complete works, and includes Elizabeth Gaskell’s Life of Charlotte Brontë. Sold as a set of 12.<ul><li>Charlotte Brontë (English).</li><li>Anne Brontë (English).</li><li>Emily Brontë (English).</li><li>Edited by Temple Scott (English).</li><li>Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Agnes Grey, Shirley, Villette, The Professor.</li><li>Edinburgh: John Grant, 1905.</li><li>Octavo.</li><li>Includes a frontispiece illustration to each volume and numerous black and white photographic plates showing Brontë country.</li><li>Recent navy half morocco, with raised bands, gilt titles and decoration to spines, and blue cloth over boards, top edges gilt, others lightly trimmed.</li></ul>

Novels of the Sisters Brontë

J.K. Rowling

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first edition</a>, first printing of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Type=Signed%2520and%2520Inscribed" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">signed</a> by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=J.K.+Rowling&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">J.K. Rowling</a>.<ul><li>J.K. Rowling – Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire – First UK Edition 2000 – SIGNED by Rowling</li><li>London: Bloomsbury, 2000.</li><li>Signed without dedication by the Rowling to the dedication page.</li><li>In the unclipped wrapper.</li></ul>

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire First Edition Signed by Rowling

Jane Austen

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Type=Fine%2520Bindings%2520and%2520Sets" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">finely bound</a> collection of the novels of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Janes+Austen&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Janes Austen</a>.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 10 volumes.</li><li>Jane Austen (English).</li><li>Edited by Reginald Brimley Johnson.</li><li>London:&nbsp;J.M. Dent &amp; Co.,&nbsp;1898.</li><li>Illustrated in color by C.E. Brock &amp; H.M. Brock.</li><li>Bound in three-quarters red morocco by Charles Lauriat, marbled boards and endpapers, top edges gilt, raised bands, gilt panels.</li></ul>

Novels

A preparatory sketch for the 1905 <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first edition</a> of The Tale of Mrs Tiggy-Winkle by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Beatrix+Potter&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Beatrix Potter</a>, accompanied by a first printing of the book.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 2.</li><li>Beatrix Potter (English).</li><li>London: Warne, 1905.</li><li>Sketch is pencil on paper, and has been mounted, framed and glazed.</li><li>The illustration itself appears on page 22 in the 1905 edition.</li></ul> Potter’s enchanting tale of the little hedgehog washer woman, an exceptionally scarce item, coupled with the first edition book; with an association to writer and Beatrix Potter expert Leslie Linder.

The Tale of Mrs Tiggy-Winkle First Edition, with Preparatory Sketch

Finely bound set of the Winchester Edition of the novels of Jane Austen.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 10.</li><li>Jane Austen (English).</li><li>Edinburgh: John Grant, 1906.</li><li>Includes frontis portrait plate in volume one; title pages printed in red and black,</li><li>Bound in half red morocco, ribbed gilt decorated spines, top edges gilt, others uncut.</li></ul>

Novels of Jane Austen

Emily Dickinson

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Type=Fine%2520Bindings%2520and%2520Sets" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">set</a> of early 20th-century printings of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Emily+Dickinson&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Emily Dickinson</a>'s first book-length series of poetry.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 3 volumes.</li><li>Emily Dickinson (American).</li><li>Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1908, 1906. </li><li>152; 230; 200 pages.</li><li>Original gilt-stamped grey cloth, top edges gilt. </li></ul> "I died for beauty, but was scarce / Adjusted in the tomb, / When one who died for truth was lain / In an adjoining room." In her lifetime, Dickinson was viewed as an eccentric recluse with an unusual gift at poetry. She would send poems to friends as "flowers," but less than a dozen of her poems appeared in print during her lifetime (anonymously, and some possibly unauthorized). Upon her death in 1886, Dickinson's sister Lavinia discovered a chest full of verse. Nearly half of them were bound in forty fascicles, little booklets sewn together by Dickinson herself. All told, there were nearly 1800 poems. Dickinson's reputation as "the Myth," the odd woman in white, persisted: no one in the family believed there would be an audience for these poems except Lavinia. It was at Lavinia's request that Mabel Loomis Todd became involved, one of the few friends of the family with a deep conviction of the importance of the poems. They also approached Dickinson's old friend, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, but he "did not think a volume advisable — they were too crude in form, he said, and the public would not accept even fine ideas in such rough and mystical dress" (Todd, November 1889, quoted in Sewell, 220). Nevertheless, Todd persevered, showing Higginson some of her favorites and obtaining a commitment to "look them over" if she organized them. Todd is often justly criticized for her editorial overreach (especially in punctuation and capitalization), but as Richard B. Sewell notes, "without the spiritual kinship she [Mabel Todd] felt with the poet and with the poems we might have had no poems (or letters) at all" (219). The poems were rejected by the first publisher Todd and Higginson approached, Houghton Mifflin, who called them "queer — the rhymes were all wrong" (Sewell, 221). The next publisher, Roberts Brothers, agreed to take on the project if the family paid for the plates, issuing POEMS in 1890. The Second Series followed in 1891, and the Third Series in 1896. Until 1914, these were the only published collections of Dickinson's poetry. These publications, later printings but issued before 1914, retain all the quirks of poems' complicated publication history: the titles supplied by Higginson, the smoothed out bits by Todd, the organization of poems into topics like "life," "love," and "nature." They retain the iconic cover design of early variants — in especially fresh condition, the beveled edges of the cloth boards sharp, the grey shade bright and clean. An unusually lovely set of early editions from this distinctly American voice.

Poems | First, Second, And Third Series

Charlotte Brontë | Edmund Dulac | Emily Brontë | Anne Brontë

Finely bound set of the Brontë sisters' novels.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 6.</li><li>Charlotte Brontë (English).</li><li>Anne Brontë (English).</li><li>Emily Brontë (English).</li><li>Illustrated Edmund Dulac (French-British).</li><li>London: J. M. Dent &amp; Sons, Ltd., 1922.</li><li>Bound by Bayntun in contemporary half green polished calf, ribbed gilt decorated spines, gilt lettered maroon spine labels, marbled pastedowns and endpapers, top edges gilt, others uncut as issued.</li></ul>

Judith Kerr

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first edition</a>, first printing of The Tiger Who Came to Tea by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Judith+Kerr&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Judith Kerr</a>.<ul><li>Judith Kerr (German-British).</li><li>London: Collins, 1968.</li></ul> A beloved children’s book about a friendly tiger who visits a girl named Sophie and eats all the family’s food. Beneath its charming simplicity lies a poignant subtext: Kerr, a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany, fled with her family in 1933. Many critics interpret the tiger as a metaphor for sudden, uncontrollable intrusion and loss—reflecting Kerr’s childhood experience of Nazi persecution.

The Tiger Who Came To Tea First Edition

<a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">First US edition</a> of Northanger Abbey by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Jane+Austen&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Jane Austen</a>, in a <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Subject=Fine%2520bindings" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">fine art binding</a> by the acclaimed Argentinian design bookbinder Sol Rébora.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 2 volumes.</li><li>Jane Austen (English).</li><li>Philadelphia:&nbsp;Carey &amp; Lea,&nbsp;1833.</li><li>12mo.</li><li>195, [1]; 196 pages.</li><li>Cotton and abaca handmade paper grey-pink endpapers.&nbsp;</li><li>Modern full grey-lavender design binding by Sol Rébora in Can Can structure with one layer of cotton cloth and two layers of Japanese paper, each element hand-painted with acrylics and textured with a patterned design impressed with deep-relief hot-stamping from silk; spines and boards stamped in dark grey.</li></ul> Often misread as critical of the gothic novels that were popular at the period of its first composition, Northanger Abbey is a more complex exploration of the genre that is especially notable for its passages in defense of the novel form – written, uncharacteristically, in first person directly from the narrator. First published in late 1817 in three volumes, this is the first edition to appear in the United States, published in two volumes by Carey &amp; Lea in an edition of only 1250 copies; it includes the famous "Biographical Notice of the Author" that first revealed Austen's name to the public as the author (as her books were all published anonymously in her lifetime). Sol Rébora is an internationally recognized design bookbinder based in Buenos Aires. Her works embody a minimalistic elegance that is nevertheless subtly complex, as in the carefully structured multiple layers used here. They are not only visually stunning, but supremely tactile. From Rèbora's artist statement: "The cloth texture is achieved using silk with a patterned design that evokes the aesthetic of the time period in which the original edition was produced, creating a visual connection with antique paper. This design also appeals to the collective memory of how custom bindings from the early 19th century might have appeared, complete with deep-relief hot-stamping impressions."

Northanger Abbey First American Edition

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first edition</a> of Mansfield Park by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Jane+Austen&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Jane Austen</a>, in a silk-impressed <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Subject=Fine%2520bindings" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">fine binding</a>.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 2 volumes.</li><li>Jane Austen (English).</li><li>Philadelphia:&nbsp;Carey &amp; Lea,&nbsp;1832. </li><li>12mo.</li><li>4, 200; 204 pages.&nbsp;</li><li>Publisher's catalogue bound at front of volume I. </li><li>Cotton and abaca handmade paper peach endpapers.</li><li>Modern full pink design binding by Sol Rébora in Can Can structure with one layer of cotton cloth and two layers of Japanese paper, each element hand-painted with acrylics and textured with a patterned design impressed with deep-relief hot-stamping from silk; spines and boards stamped in dark grey. </li></ul> First US edition of Austen's third published novel — in a stunning fine art binding by the acclaimed Argentinian design bookbinder Sol Rébora. "I was quiet but I was not blind." Among Austen's works, Mansfield Park especially demonstrates how careful contrasts of characters and plot twists can bring out subtle ironies. First published in 1814 in three volumes, this is the first edition to appear in the United States, published in two volumes by Carey &amp; Lea in an edition of only 1250 copies. Sol Rébora is an internationally recognized design bookbinder based in Buenos Aires. Her works embody a minimalistic elegance that is nevertheless subtly complex, as in the carefully structured multiple layers used here. They are not only visually stunning, but supremely tactile. From Rèbora's artist statement: "The cloth texture is achieved using silk with a patterned design that evokes the aesthetic of the time period in which the original edition was produced, creating a visual connection with antique paper. This design also appeals to the collective memory of how custom bindings from the early 19th century might have appeared, complete with deep-relief hot-stamping impressions."

Mansfield Park | First American Edition

A beautifully printed and presented copy of Dickinson's poem Under the Light, Yet Under.<ul><li>Emily Dickinson (American).</li><li>Designed by Marc Freedman.</li><li>New York:&nbsp;The Sarabande Press,&nbsp;October 1982.</li><li>Number 18 of 20 copies.</li><li>Paper designed by Karen Miles, and made, with the assistance of Beverly Van Ness, at the Russell-Fleming Papermill.&nbsp;</li><li>Linen folding panels.</li><li>On one panel and 3 panels of paper construction.</li></ul>

Under the Light, Yet Under

Fine copy of Potter's The Tailor of Gloucester, privately printed by the author.<ul><li>Beatrix Potter (English).</li><li>London: Privately Printed by Strangeways &amp; Sons, 1902.</li><li>Unpaginated.</li><li>Illustrated with a frontis and 15 color plates by Potter.</li><li>Limited to 500 copies.</li><li>Bound in the original pink pictorial boards.</li></ul>

The Tailor of Gloucester

Virginia Woolf

<a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">First edition</a>, first printing of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?creators=Virginia%2520Woolf" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Virginia Woolf's</a>&nbsp;The Voyage Out.<ul><li>Virginia Woolf (English).</li><li>London: Duckworth &amp; Co., 1915.</li><li>318 pages.</li><li>16 pages of publisher’s advertisements.</li><li>Bound by The Chelsea Bindery in full morocco with gilt title, marbled endpapers, handsewn headbands and all edges gilt.</li></ul>

The Voyage Out (First Edition, First Printing)

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

First edition of Shelley's second novel Valperga.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 3.</li><li>Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (English).</li><li>Valperga: or, The Life and Adventures of Castruccio, Prince of Lucca.</li><li>London: for G. &amp; W. B. Whittaker, 1823.</li><li>Bound in half tan speckled calf, gilt decorated spines, gilt lettered black morocco spine labels, marbled edges.</li></ul>

Valperga

First US edition of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=jane+austen&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Austen</a>'s first novel — in a stunning <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Subject=Fine%2520bindings" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">fine art binding</a> by the acclaimed Argentinian design bookbinder Sol Rébora.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 2 volumes.</li><li>Jane Austen (English).</li><li>Philadelphia:&nbsp;Carey &amp; Lea,&nbsp;1833.</li><li>12mo.</li><li>199, [1]; 189, [1] pages.</li><li>Modern full grey-pink design binding by Sol Rébora in Can Can structure with one layer of cotton cloth and two layers of Japanese paper, each element hand-painted with acrylics and textured with a patterned design impressed with deep-relief hot-stamping from silk; spines and boards stamped in dark grey, cotton and abaca handmade paper grey-pink endpapers.</li></ul> Austen's first novel uses the love stories of two sisters to explore the complexities and contradictions in the gendered expectations of the Regency era: a woman will be praised for her capacity to feel emotion (her sensibility), but not too much; a woman will be praised for her independent and responsible nature (her sense), but not too much. First published in late 1811 in three volumes, this is the first edition to appear in the United States, published in two volumes by Carey &amp; Lea in an edition of only 1250 copies. Sol Rébora is an internationally recognized design bookbinder based in Buenos Aires. Her works embody a minimalistic elegance that is nevertheless subtly complex, as in the carefully structured multiple layers used here. They are not only visually stunning, but supremely tactile. From Rèbora's artist statement: "The cloth texture is achieved using silk with a patterned design that evokes the aesthetic of the time period in which the original edition was produced, creating a visual connection with antique paper. This design also appeals to the collective memory of how custom bindings from the early 19th century might have appeared, complete with deep-relief hot-stamping impressions." A magnificent, unique copy of an Austen first.

Sense And Sensibility | First American Edition

Margaret Atwood

Signed first American edition presentation copy of Atwood's first novel. <ul><li>Margaret Atwood (Canadian).</li><li>Boston: Little, Brown &amp; Co., 1969.</li><li>Inscribed by Atwood on the half-title "For Bart &amp; Roby best wishes Margaret Atwood 1975."</li><li>Bound in publisher's original pink cloth-backed boards, gilt-lettered spine, with the pictorial dust jacket, not price clipped.</li></ul>

The Edible Woman

Finely bound set of the novels, works and letters of Jane Austen.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 12.</li><li>Jane Austen (English).</li><li>Edinburgh: John Grant, 1911-12.</li><li>Engraved frontis portrait plate in volume one.</li><li>The Winchester Edition.</li><li>Bound by Atkinson in full tan morocco, gilt lettered red and green morocco spine labels, top edges gilt with marbled pastedowns and endpapers.</li></ul>

The Novels of Jane Austen

The <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first US edition</a>, first printing of Pride and Prejudice by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=jane+austen&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Jane Austen</a>.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 2 volumes.</li><li>Jane Austen (English).</li><li>Philadelphia:&nbsp;Carey &amp; Lea,&nbsp;1832.</li><li>12mo.</li><li>199, [1]; 209, [1] pages</li><li>Publisher's catalogue bound at front of Volume I.</li><li>Modern full peach design binding by Sol Rébora in Can Can structure with one layer of cotton cloth and two layers of Japanese paper, each element hand-painted with acrylics and textured with a patterned design impressed with deep-relief hot-stamping from silk; spines and boards stamped in dark grey, cotton and abaca handmade paper peach endpapers.</li></ul> First US edition in a stunning fine art binding by the acclaimed Argentinian design bookbinder Sol Rébora. Austen's most beloved novel is simultaneously a unique production of profound artistic confidence and an entertaining popular love story: it builds on a long-established tradition of English courtship novels in conversation with many women authors before her like Frances Burney (from whose book Cecelia Austen may have borrowed the very phrase "pride and prejudice"). Austen admitted in a letter that she thought her book's heroine, Elizabeth Bennett, "as delightful a creature as ever appeared in print" (29 January 1813) – and generations of readers have agreed with her. First published in 1813 in three volumes, this is the first edition to appear in the United States, published in two volumes by Carey &amp; Lea in an edition of only 750 copies. Sol Rébora is an internationally recognized design bookbinder based in Buenos Aires. Her works embody a minimalistic elegance that is nevertheless subtly complex, as in the carefully structured multiple layers used here. They are not only visually stunning, but supremely tactile. From Rèbora's artist statement: "The cloth texture is achieved using silk with a patterned design that evokes the aesthetic of the time period in which the original edition was produced, creating a visual connection with antique paper. This design also appeals to the collective memory of how custom bindings from the early 19th century might have appeared, complete with deep-relief hot-stamping impressions." A magnificent, unique copy of an Austen first.

Pride And Prejudice | First American Edition

The first Vox edition of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=jane+austen&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Austen</a>'s works, <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Type=Fine%2520Bindings%2520and%2520Sets" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">finely bound</a> and illustrated.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 7 volumes.</li><li>Jane Austen (English).</li><li>London:&nbsp;Dent,&nbsp;[1933-4].</li><li>Octavo.</li><li>Illustrated in color and black and white by Maximilien Vox.</li><li>Introduction by Emile Legouis.</li><li>Half blue calf, gilt spine, top edge gilt by Bayntun, Bath for Charles Lauriat, Boston.</li></ul> The first edition illustrated in line drawings and watercolors by French artist Maxmilien Vox, whose prefatory letter to the publisher Dent states "I have tried to attune myself to an art which never stresses, records only the essential, draws rather than paints: an art which aims at grace and rhythm rather than at intensity of expression. " Includes all six of the novels, plus a volume that collects Sanditon, The Watsons, Lady Susan, Plan of a Novel, and the Cancelled Chapter of Persuasion.

The Works of Jane Austen

Charlotte Brontë | Emily Brontë | Anne Brontë | Elizabeth Gaskell

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Type=Fine%2520Bindings%2520and%2520Sets" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">finely bound</a> and illustrated Haworth edition of works by the <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Bront%C3%AB+sisters&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Brontë sisters</a>.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 7 volumes.</li><li>The Life and Works of Charlotte Brontë and her Sisters. With Introductions to the Works by Mrs. Humphry Ward and an Introduction and Notes to the Life by Clement K. Shorter.</li><li>Charlotte Brontë (English).</li><li>Emily Brontë (English).</li><li>Ann Brontë (English).</li><li>Elizabeth Gaskell (English).</li><li>London:&nbsp;Smith, Elder, &amp; Co,&nbsp;1905-1914.</li><li>Octavo.</li><li>Illustrated with frontispieces in each volume.</li><li>Full red morocco, spines gilt with raised bands, boards ruled in gilt, turn-ins gilt, top edge gilt, others untrimmed, by Zaehnsdorf.</li></ul> An excellent set of these classics of world literature by the Brontë sisters: Wuthering Heights by Emily; Agnes Grey and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne; Jane Eyre, Villette, Shirley, and The Professor, by Charlotte; with the Poems of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell; and Mrs. Gaskell’s Life of Charlotte Brontë.

Works of the Bronte Sisters, with The Life and Works of Charlotte Brontë and her Sisters

Margery Williams Bianco | William Nicholson

The rarest variant of the <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first edition</a> of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Margery+Williams+Bianco&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Margery Williams Bianco</a>'s beloved children's tale, The Velveteen Rabbit.<ul><li>Margery Williams Bianco (American).</li><li>Illustrated by William Nicholson (British).</li><li>New York &amp; London:&nbsp;George H. Doran &amp; Heinemann,&nbsp;1922.</li><li>[8], 19, [1] pages.</li><li>Illustrated with 4 full-page and 3 double-page color lithographs.</li><li>First printing, US issue in a variant (likely trial) UK jacket.</li><li>Original pictorial paper boards, original unclipped (no price) variant pictorial dust jacket (printed in single color, no logo on spine, blank rear panel), color pictorial rabbit endpapers, housed in a custom full leather clamshell box.</li></ul> "The truth is I don't think I've ever found anything as purely 'moving' as the end of The Velveteen Rabbit" – David Foster Wallace This book captures the wistful attachment to our childhood toys through the story of a stuffed rabbit that hopes the love of its owner can make it real. It is one of the great collaborations in modern children's books, with the lithographs and the text equally invoking bittersweet affection: "You were Real to the Boy [...] because he loved you." Later printings did not use lithography to produce Nicholson's drawings, making the first printing especially distinctive in the quality of its lustrous illustrations. This is a remarkable copy of one of the first modern picture books. Scarce, in an unrestored dust jacket, and especially in this variant.

The Velveteen Rabbit | First Edition

<a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">First edition</a> of one of famed <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?Book%20Subject=Women%2520Writers" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">women writer's</a> of the 20th century, <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?creators=Virginia%2520Woolf" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Virginia Woolf's</a> early novels. <ul><li>Virginia Woolf (English).</li><li>London: Leonard &amp; Virginia Woolf at The Hogarth Press, Hogarth House,&nbsp;Richmond,&nbsp;1922.</li><li>Bound in full yellow cloth with paper label.</li></ul> Jacob's Room is one of Virginia Woolf's early novels. It grapples with the personal traumas of World War I, and is her first time she experiments with modernist techniques that would become central to her style.

Jacob's Room

The <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first edition</a>, first impression, hardback issue of the first <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Harry+Potter&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Harry Potter</a> book; the rarest and most desirable format of the series by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=J.K.+Rowling&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">J.K. Rowling</a>.<ul><li>J.K. Rowling (English).</li><li>Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.</li><li>London: Bloomsbury, 1997.</li><li>Octavo.</li><li>Original matt laminated printed paper boards, spine and front cover lettered in white, yellow, dark green and black, without dust jacket, as issued, housed in a red quarter morocco solander box by the Chelsea Bindery.&nbsp;</li></ul> All the required points of the first printing are present: Bloomsbury imprint, 10-down-to-1 number line, no space between “Thomas” and “Taylor” on p. 4, the list of equipment on p. 53 with “1 wand” appearing twice, and the misprint “Philospher’s” on the rear cover. Both paperback and hardback issues of the first impression were published on 26 June 1997. Only 500 copies of the first printing of Philosopher’s Stone were issued in hardback, of which it is thought around 300 were sold to libraries and schools. The publisher has stated “I think the assumption in 1997 would have been that you would sell 500 hardcovers of any good book to public libraries so that edition would be aimed at them. The general edition for the market would be a paperback” (Errington, p. 4). Identifying libraries as the intended buyers of this issue explains the lack of a dust jacket (Errington states a jacket “was simply not required by libraries”). The small number of copies not accessioned by libraries explains the scarcity of this issue, and why copies in collectible condition are rare. This copy, bearing a price sticker from W. H. Smith on the rear cover, identifies it as one of a small number sold on the high street.

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone | First Edition, First Impression

First edition finely bound copy of Woolf's The Years.<ul><li>Virginia Woolf (English).</li><li>London: The Hogarth Press, 1937.</li><li>Bound in full green morocco, ribbed gilt decorated spine with all edges gilt and marbled pastedowns and endpapers.</li></ul>

The Years

Inscribed later edition of Potter's The Tale of Pigling Bland.<ul><li>Beatrix Potter (English).</li><li>London: Frederick Warne &amp; Co. Ltd, [after 1918].</li><li>Inscribed on the half-title by the author "with kind regards from Beatrix Potter," and with additional ink inscription "To Peggy, from Mrs Postlethwaite &amp; Mary, Sept. 8th 1933."</li><li>Includes 15 color plates (including frontispiece), black &amp; white illustrations to text.</li><li>Bound in pictorial endpapers with original pale green pictorial boards.</li></ul> The Postlethwaite family lived at High Green Gate near to Castle Cottage, Beatrix Potter's Lakeland home after 1909. It is likely that this book was originally given to the Postlethwaite family (probably to one of the girls, Mary or Amanda) as a gift from Beatrix, and they then later gave it away to a friend "Peggy."

The Tale of Pigling Bland

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Type=Fine%2520Bindings%2520and%2520Sets" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">finely bound</a> early edition of the works of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Jane+Austen&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Jane Austen</a>.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 12 volumes.</li><li>Jane Austen (English).</li><li>Boston:&nbsp;Little, Brown, and Company,&nbsp;1898.</li><li>Illustrated frontispiece. </li><li>Marbled endpapers, three-quarters brown Morocco leather, marbled boards, top edges gilt, raised bands, gilt floral panels on spine. </li></ul>

Jane Austen’s Works

An early edition of The Tale of Peter Rabbit by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Beatrix+Potter&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Beatrix Potter</a>.<ul><li>Beatrix Potter (English).</li><li>London: Frederick Warne &amp; Co., [1905].</li><li>16mo.</li><li>Color frontispiece, plain title vignette, 23 color illustrations.</li><li>Bound in the publisher's brown paper covered boards with fielded illustrative paste-down of Peter Rabbit, illustrated endpapers.</li></ul> The rarer fourth printing. Beloved by generations of children but banned in 1985 by the Inner London Education Authority for the portrayal of exclusively 'middle-class rabbits.'

The Tale of Peter Rabbit

Mary Shelley | Frederick Schiller

Third edition, fourth printing of the first revised edition of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Mary+Shelley&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Mary Shelley</a>'s masterpiece <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=frankenstein&amp;pfilters.dateRange=past" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Frankenstein</a>, and the last to contain an illustration with the first printing of the engraved frontis and additional engraved title-page dated 1831.<ul><li>Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (English).</li><li>Frederick Schiller (German)[Author of The Ghost-Seer].&nbsp;</li><li>London: Richard Bentley, 1839.</li><li>Bound in the publisher's original blind stamped straight grained brown-maroon cloth.</li></ul> In her introduction, Shelley contextualizes the creation of her tale: "It proved a wet, ungenial summer, and incessant rain often confined us for days to the house. Some volumes of ghost stories, translated from the German into French, fell into our hands… 'We will each write a ghost story,' said Lord Byron; and his proposition was acceded to."

Frankenstein: Or, The Modern Prometheus, [bound with] The Ghost-Seer

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Type=Fine%2520Bindings%2520and%2520Sets" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">finely bound</a> edition of The Works of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=bronte&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Charlotte Brontë and her Sisters</a>.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 7 volumes.</li><li>Charlotte Brontë (English).</li><li>Anne Brontë (English).</li><li>Emily Brontë (English)</li><li>Elizabeth Gaskell (English).</li><li>The Life and Works of Charlotte Bronte &amp; Her Sisters. Haworth Edition. With Introductions to the Works By Mrs Humphrey Ward, and an Introduction and Notes to the Life by Clement K. Shorter. </li><li>London: Smith, Elder, &amp; Co., [and] John Murray, 1905-1926.</li><li>Octavo.</li><li>Extra-illustrated with a hand-written genealogical table and a black and white photograph of “Wuthering Heights” to the Wuthering Heights volume.</li><li>Various printings.</li><li>Recently re-bound in tan half calf, with raised bands, gilt titles to contrasting red and green labels, further gilt ruling to spine, and matching cloth over boards, top edges gilt, others lightly trimmed.</li></ul> The desirable Haworth edition of the Brontes' classic works, including the Poems and Gaskell’s Life of Charlotte Bronte.

The Life and Works of Charlotte Bronte and Her Sisters

A finely bound and illustrated collection of the Thorton Edition of the novels of the Brontë sisters.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 12.</li><li>Charlotte Brontë (English).</li><li>Emily Brontë&nbsp;(English).</li><li>Anne Brontë&nbsp;(English).</li><li>Includes The Life of Charlotte Brontë by E.C. Gaskell.</li><li>Edinburgh: John Grant, 1924.</li><li>Bound in half maroon morocco, ribbed gilt decorated spines, textblock uncut as issued, by Atkinson.</li></ul>

The Novels of The Sisters Brontë

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Type=Fine%2520Bindings%2520and%2520Sets" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">finely bound set</a> of the works of the <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Bront%C3%AB&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Brontë</a> sisters.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 7 volumes.</li><li>Charlotte Brontë (English).</li><li>Anne Brontë (English).</li><li>Emily Brontë (English).</li><li>London: Smith, Elder, &amp; Co., 1883-5.</li><li>Engraved frontis and additional engraved title-page in each volume.</li><li>Bound in contemporary half tan calf, ribbed gilt decorated spines, gilt lettered brown and red morocco spine labels, top edges gilt.</li></ul>

The Life And Works Of Charlotte Bronte And Her Sisters

Ayn Rand

<a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Type=Signed%2520and%2520Inscribed" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Signed</a> limited special anniversary edition of the influential <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Ayn+Rand&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Ayn Rand</a> novel.<ul><li>Ayn Rand (Russian-American).</li><li>New York:&nbsp;Random House,&nbsp;[1967]. </li><li>[8], 1168, [1], [3] pages.&nbsp;</li><li>Signed and numbered by Rand to limitation page, this copy #1278.&nbsp;</li><li>Original full blue cloth, gilt-lettered front board and spine, blue topstain, blue endpapers, fore-edge machine deckle, in original clear glassine and grey-blue paper slipcase.</li></ul> Unlike most philosophers, Rand chose to use novels as a popular vehicle to explain her theory of "rational individualism." Atlas Shrugged has impacted the thinking of prominent American conservatives and libertarians from Alan Greenspan to Peter Thiel. A nice copy of this increasingly uncommon edition.

Atlas Shrugged Signed Limited Anniversary Edition

George Eliot

<a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">First edition</a> of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=George+Eliot&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Eliot</a>'s third novel, a fable in realist dress, praised by some as the greatest of her works.<ul><li>George Eliot (English).</li><li>Edinburgh and London:&nbsp;William Blackwood and Sons,&nbsp;1861. </li><li>[4], [6], 364, 16 pages.​&nbsp;</li><li>Original embossed russet cloth, gilt-stamped spine, binding A (Carter), most leaves unopened, publisher's ad for Alexander Carlyle at front; Blackwood catalogue at rear, binder ticker to rear paste-down.</li></ul> The idea for Eliot's only one-volume novel came "quite suddenly, as a sort of legendary tale" suggested by her childhood memory of seeing a weaver (as recounted in a letter to her publisher). By degrees she "became inclined to a more realistic treatment," though a kernel of fantasy remains under the careful working-out of ethical and material realities. Received by one contemporary critic as "boorish twaddle," SILAS MARNER has also been hailed as "the most flawless of George Eliot's works" (Joan Bennett).

SILAS MARNER: The Weaver of Raveloe

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first edition</a> of Night And Day by <a href="sothebys.com/en/search?query=virginia%20woolf&amp;tab=objects" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Virginia Woolf</a>.<ul><li>Virginia Woolf (English).</li><li>London: Duckworth, 1919.</li><li>(ii) 538 pages, (i), complete with the final publishers ad leaf.</li><li>Bound in full blue morocco, ribbed gilt decorated spine, covers ruled in gilt, top edge gilt.</li></ul>

Night And Day First Edition

P.D. James

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first UK edition</a>, first printing of A Mind to Murder by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=P.D.%20James&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">P.D. James</a>, <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book?locale=en&amp;Book%20Type=Signed%2520and%2520Inscribed" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">inscribed</a> by the author.<ul><li>P.D James (English).</li><li>London:&nbsp;Faber and Faber,&nbsp;1963.&nbsp;</li><li>Octavo.</li><li>224 pages.</li><li>Inscribed "To Dick" by P.D. James on title page.</li><li>Spine is pink and white with black lettering, dust jacket protected by mylar covering, price uncut: "18s net" on front flap.</li></ul>

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