Gift Ideas
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KAPITSA, Olga and Yuri VASNETSOV.
Зайка [Little Hare] .
Leningrad, Detizdat Ts K VLKSM, 1936.
First edition of this collection of eleven traditional folk tales and songs about the hare and his encounters with huntsmen, foxes and other animals, charmingly written by Olga Kapitsa and illustrated by Yuri Vasnetsov, one of Russia’s leading artists of children’s books.
Worldcat finds two...£350
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VIRGIL Maro, Publius, and Giovanni Andrea dell’ANGUILLARA (trans.).
Il primo libro della Eneida di Vergilio,...
Padua, Gratioso Perchacino, 1564.
First edition of the first book of Anguillara’s verse translation of the Aeneid, a copy printed on strong paper and inscribed by the author. The humanist, poet, and successful translator of Ovid Giovanni Andrea dell’Anguillara (1517–1572) undertook to translate into Italian ottava...
£2500
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CARDONNEL, Adam de.
Picturesque Antiquities of Scotland [I–II] …
London: Printed for the Author, and sold by Edwards … also by Edwards’s, in Halifax. 1788.
First edition, the very rare issue with the plates in sepia, printed directly onto thick wove paper.
£975
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AKHMATOVA, Anna Andreevna, translator.
Golosa poetov. Stikhi zarubezhnykh poetov v perevode Anny Akhmatovoi [Poets’...
Moscow, “Progress”, 1965.
First edition: translations by Akhmatova of a selection of pieces by Polish, Czech, Slovak, Bulgarian, Yugoslavian, Norwegian, and Indian poets.
£450
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ANSELMI, Giorgio, the younger.
Georgii Anselmi nepotis Epigrammaton libri septem. Sosthyrides. Peplum Palladis. Aeglogae...
Venice, Maffeo Pasini, September 1528.
The definitive edition of the epigrams of Giorgio Anselmi, grandson of the astrologer and music theorist of the same name, with several epigrams on his grandfather’s lost works on magic and the occult.
£875
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KOLLÁR, Jan.
Díla básnická … we dwau djljch [‘A Collection of Poems … in two parts’].
Buda, no publisher, but ‘with the types Gyuriána a Bagó’, 1845.
First collected edition of Jan Kollár’s works, inscribed to fellow poet and ‘brother Slav’ Ognjeslav Utješenowić-Ostrožinski, with an additional autograph sonnet written in his honour.
£1750
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HEMINGWAY, Ernest, and Evgenia KALASHNIKOVA (translator).
Imet’ i ne imet’ [To have and have not].
Moscow, Goslitizdat, 1938.
First edition in Russian of To have and have not (1937), with an introduction by the Soviet critic Ivan Anisimov. Hemingway’s first appearance in Russian was Death in the Afternoon in 1934, when he was praised in the Soviet Union as an active anti-Fascist, and he soon became a...
£1250
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VERLAINE, Paul, and Léon LEBÈGUE (illustrator).
Fêtes gallantes.
Paris, F. Ferroud for the Librairie des Amateurs, 30 July 1913.
Limited edition on vélin teinté d’Arches, numbered 430 of 500 copies, with etchings by Lebègue. First published in 1869, Verlaine’s Fêtes gallantes are here exquisitely printed and illustrated by Léon Lebègue (1863 – 1944) and finely bound by Flammarion.
£750
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SCOTT, Sir Walter.
The Lady of the Lake … with all his Introductions and Notes, various Readings, and the Editor’s Notes.
Edinburgh, Robert Cadell, 1851.
An attractive Scottish 'Mauchline ware' tartan binding. Mauchline ware bindings – the name comes from Smith’s boxware factory at Mauchline in Ayrshire – were made from thin wooden boards (often sycamore) decorated with tartan or pictorial designs, heavily varnished, and attached to the text...
£750
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[BURNS, Robert.] BRIGHT, Henry A[rthur].
Some Account of the Glenriddell MSS. of Burns’s Poems: with several Poems never before...
Liverpool, Gilbert G. Walmsley …, 1874.
First edition, scarce, a presentation copy: a privately-printed catalogue of the famous Glenriddell manuscripts; Burns’s preface and several poems are printed here for the first time.
£100
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RAMSAY, Allan.
The Gentle Shepherd, a Scotch Pastoral … attempted in English by Margaret Turner.
London: Printed for the Author, by T. Bensley; and sold by G. Nicol … and by Mrs. Turner … 1790.
First edition of this parallel-text translation of Ramsay’s Scots verse drama, a subscriber’s copy from the library of Mary, Lady Vincent, née Chiswell, wife of Sir Francis Vincent (1747–1793), resident consul at Venice.
£600
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[FRASER, William Augustus, Sir.]
Poems by the Knight of Morar.
London, Whittingham and Wilkins, 1867.
First edition, privately printed, a presentation copy inscribed on the title-page ‘From the Author . Paris. 1867.’
£350
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FLORUS, Lucius.
Lucii Flori rerum ab urbe condita liber primus [– quartus].
[Venice, in aedibus Aldi et Andreae Soceri, March 1521.]
Florus’s epitome of Roman history, extracted from the Aldine edition of March 1521 which comprised an epitome of Livy, Florus, and Niccolò Perotti’s translation of Polybius.
£750
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[SOUTH AMERICA.]
Album of sketches made in Trinidad and Tobago and Venezuela.
1840s?
An attractive album of sketches by an anonymous Francophone artist made during a trip to South America.
£2750
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[CALLIGRAPHIC SCORES.]
Two anonymous manuscript scores.
London, 1820s.
Two charming productions, sent as anonymous gifts, presumably to the wife or daughter(s) of Col. Thomas Nuttall (or Nuthall) (d. 1829) of the Madras Cavalry.
£850
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ROBINSON, Mrs. Mary (Darby).
Lyrical Tales …
London, Printed for T. N. Longman and O. Rees … by Biggs and Co. Bristol, 1800.
First edition, a revisionary response to Lyrical Ballads (1798) by the actress turned royal mistress turned author, Mary ‘Perdita’ Robinson, published only eight days before her death.
£1250
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NEW RIDDLE BOOK (A)
or a Whetstone for dull Wits … Printed at Derby, for the benefit of the travelling Stationers.
[J. Drewry? 1790?]
An attractive illustrated riddle chapbook. The solutions include ‘a pipping pounded into Cyder’, a man fleeing his scolding wife, a hog fattened with acorns, a young virgin, a mermaid, and a paper kite, though how one would ever guess ‘a Taylor at Dinner with a Dish of Cucumbers, served up with...
£750
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RENOWNED HISTORY (The)
of Primrose Prettyface, who by her Sweetness of Temper, & Love of Learning, was raised from being the Daughter...
London, Printed & sold by J. Marshall & Co. … (Price 6d in Gilt Paper – 9d bound in Red.) [1788?]
One of three undated editions, probably the last (adding Marshall’s Cheapside premises at 17 Queen St to the imprint), but the only one with an engraved title-page and frontispiece.
£1000
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DONNE, John.
Devotions upon Emergent Occasions, and severall Steps in my Sicknes ...
London, Printed for Thomas Jones … 1627.
Third (and last lifetime) edition of Donne’s most familiar prose work, composed during his convalescence in 1623–4 from the ‘spotted Feaver’ which nearly killed him. It consists of twenty-three ‘Stationes, sive Periodi in Morbo’, each comprising a meditation, expostulation, and prayer.
£13500
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ECKARTSHAUSEN, Karl von.
Dieu est l’amour le plus pur, ma prière et ma contemplation. Par Eckartshausen. Paris, chez L.
Duprat-Duverger, rue des Grands-Augustins, no. 21, [1805-1813].
Scarce edition of a French translation of Gott ist die reinste Liebe by the German Catholic mystic Karl von Eckartshausen (1752–1803), this copy formerly in the possession of the long-term lover of Queen Victoria’s father.
£475