Gift Ideas

  1. [POUND.] 

    Ezra Pound at Seventy.

    [New York, New Directions, 1955.] 

    A small celebratory booklet printing tributes by Auden, Cummings, Eliot, Hemingway (‘Will gladly pay tribute to Ezra but what I would like to do is get him the hell out of St. Elizabeth’s’), Archibald Macleish, Jose de Pina Martins, Marianne Moore, Norman Pearson, Spender, and Edith Sitwell.

    £30

  2. [POUND.]

    FROBENIUS, Leo. Il Liuto di Gassire. Legenda Africana con una nota di Ezra Pound.

    Milan, All’insegna del pesce d’oro [Scheiwiller], [1961].

    First edition, translated into Italian from the German by Siegfried Walter di Rachewiltz, Pound’s grandson (b. 1947), and with a ten-page note by Pound. A presentation copy, inscribed ‘For Geoffrey Bridson with the compliments of Siegfried W. de Rachewiltz / Brunnenburg 30. 5. 61’.

    £100

  3. POUND, Ezra, and Ernest FENELLOSA.

    Introduzione ai Nô, con un drama in un atto di Motokiyo: Kagekiyo.

    Milan, All’insegna del pesce d’oro [Scheiwiller], [1958].

    Third edition, translations of Pound’s ‘Introduction’ and one play from Certain Noble Plays of Japan by his daughter Mary de Rachewiltz. This third edition added ‘Un intervallo di 40 anni’ by Pound, dated November 1958.

    £30

  4. [I CHING.]

    WILHELM, Richard, and Cary F. BAYNES, translators; C. G. JUNG, foreword. The I Ching or Book of Changes.

    London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1974.

    Third edition, reprinted, in a striking moulded morocco binding by David Sellars, his first commission and most formative work.

    £1950

  5. ANDREWS, Mark E.

    The Science and Engineering of Materials: A Theatre of Machine Books, 1472–1800.

    Toronto, AE Publications, 2023.

    An extraordinary survey of four centuries of machine books, tracing the evolution of printing techniques and draughtsmanship alongside the development of the machines themselves. In this catalogue of eighty-six works from his collection of books on civil engineering, Mark Andrews situates a series...

    £75

  6. ANDREWS, Mark E.

    The Science and Engineering of Water: An illustrated catalogue of books and manuscripts on Italian hydraulics,...

    Toronto, A.E. Publications, 2022.

    A lavishly illustrated catalogue, tracing the development of science and engineering through the early modern period. Some 367 printed books, manuscripts, and maps are presented in chronological order, highlighting the relationship between the evolution of ideas and the authors who documented...

    £75

  7. [LITURGY.]

    L’Office de la Semaine Sainte, selon le Messel et Breviaire Romain; avec la concordance du Messel; et Breviaire de...

    Paris, par la Compagnie des libraires associez au livre de la Semaine Sainte, 1700.

    Uncommon edition of the offices for Holy Week in parallel French and Latin, in an attractive binding bearing the arms and monogram of Philippe I, duc d’Orléans (1640–1701).

    £1250

  8. TRAVERS, John.

    A Letter to the Editor of the Courier Newspaper, in Reply to an Article inserted in that Journal of the 22d August,...

    London, Effingham Wilson, 1834.

    Second, expanded edition of this tract on reforming the duties on tea imported from China to Britain, this copy presented to the Sinologist Sir George T. Staunton, member of the Select Committee on Tea Duties and author of the letter appended here, likely with his annotations and corrections; bound...

    £850

  9. KEATS, John.

    Endymion. A poetic romance … with engravings by John Buckland-Wright.

    [London,] The Golden Cockerel Press, [1947].

    No. 200 of 500 copies of the Golden Cockerel Endymion (the first 100 specially bound in full vellum), also found in brown buckram rather than red as here; Buckland-Wright’s greatest work and one of the most important Golden Cockerel publications, begun in 1943 but not completed until...

    £1750

  10. FLOWER, Stanley Smyth.

    Album of 14 watercolours of India and Malaya.

    India and Malaya, October 1894 to August 1895.

    A charming album of vivid watercolour views of India and Malaysia, painted by a British zoologist and army officer during his time serving in India and the Straits Settlement.

    £750

  11. HUGO, Victor.

    Notre-Dame de Paris. Par Victor Hugo. Troisième edition … Tome premier [– deuxième].

    Paris, Charles Gosselin, 1831.

    First edition, third issue, of Victor Hugo’s great historical novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame, one of 275 copies printed.

    £7500

  12. COLONNA, Fabio.

    Φυτοβασανος, sive Plantarum aliquot historia …

    Naples, Orazio Salviani, 1592.

    First edition, a landmark in botanical illustration, ‘the first strictly botanical book with intaglio prints’ (Blunt).

    £4000

  13. [DENS, Pierre, editor.]

    Tractatus selecti de sponsalibus et matrimonio. Duae partes.

    Louvain, Louis Joseph Urban, 1775.

    Uncommon first edition of this interesting work on the legal aspects of betrothal and marriage, in a handsome contemporary binding.

    £800

  14. NERVAL, Gérard de.

    Lorely, souvenirs d’Allemagne. Paris, [Gustave Gratiot for] D.

    Giraud et J. Dagneau, 1852.

    First edition, second issue, of a collection of Nerval’s writings on Germany.

    £800

  15. ANACREON.

    Ανακρεοντος τηιου μελη praefixo commentario quo poëtae genus traditur et bibliotheca Anacreonteia...

    Parma, [Bodoni] ‘in aedibus Palatinis’, 1791.

    Thick paper copy, apparently one of 12 copies from an edition of 212. This attractive edition of Anacreon’s Odaria was edited by G.C. Amaduzzi and printed by Bodoni. ‘The editions of 1785 and 1791 are printed in capital letters, and more elegant and exquisitely finished productions...

    £650

  16. TENNYSON, Alfred, Lord.

    Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington…

    London: Edward Moxon … 1852.

    First edition of Tennyson’s ode to the Duke of Wellington; one of his earliest Laureate poems, it was, of course, a patriotic piece, but also, as a Horatian ode in English, a notable technical achievement.

    £100

  17. CHALKHILL, John.

    Thealma and Clearchus. A pastoral History in smooth and easie Verse. Written long since by John Chalkhill, Esq;...

    London, Printed for Benj. Tooke … 1683.

    First edition of Chalkhill’s unfinished pastoral poem, with the corrected state of the title, designating the author as ‘an acquaintant and friend of Edmund [originally ‘Edward’] Spencer’.

    £1850

  18. ROTH, Henry.

    Call it Sleep.

    London, Michael Joseph, 1963.

    First UK edition of Roth’s precocious masterpiece, generally regarded as the finest novel of Jewish immigration to America before and after the turn of the century.

    £250

  19. [BECKFORD, William.]

    Vathek, conte arabe.

    Paris, Poinçot; Chatellerault, P. J. B Guimbert, 1787.

    Extremely rare, the only traced copy, of a reissue of the sheets of the first Paris edition with a provincially-printed cancel title adding to the imprint the imprimeur-libraire Pierre Jean Baptiste Guimbert, of Châtellerault. This is the rarest piece of Beckfordiana we have ever encountered,...

    £3750