Results 33 - 40 of 58 results


The Old Man and the Sea - Ernest Hemingway

1952 - Charles Scribner's Sons, New York - First Edition, First Issue
‘I am a strange old man’.

‘But are you strong enough now for a truly big fish?’

‘I think so. And there are many tricks’.

A bright first edition, housed in custom blue cloth clamshell box with swordfish design and navy spine label lettered in gilt.
 
More details

Price HK$ 25,000



1889 - J. W. Arrowsmith, Bristol - First Edition, first Issue with 'Quay Street' on title page, second state.
First edition, in a fancy binding, of one of the funniest English books ever written, and if you like to play on the water, should be required reading. In the words of Jerome K. Jerome ‘other books may excel this in depth of thought and knowledge of human nature: other books may rival it in originality and size; but, for hopeless and incurable veracity, nothing yet discovered can surpass it.’

Brilliantly illustrated throughout with small sketches and full page plates by A. Frederics.

The ultimate late-Victorian satire of the Great British Holiday, involving an ill-conceived jaunt along the Thames and a host of fabulously English characters including the relentlessly Pan-like canine companion Montmorency. Adapted in many forms, and notably voiced as an audiobook by Hugh Laurie, it develops an idyllically inept vision of England still familiar today.
 
More details

Price HK$ 5,000



Profiles in Courage - Senator John F. Kennedy

1956 - Harper &, New York - First Edition
A fine first edition in bright clean and delicate dust jacket, which is usually encountered in a far worse state.

Profiles in Courage’, which Kennedy dedicated to his wife Jacqueline Kennedy, received the Pulitzer Prize for history in 1957.

This is a book about that most admirable of human virtues – courage. “Grace under pressure,” Ernest Hemingway defined it.’

Kennedy’s election to the House in 1946 and the Senate in 1952 gave him personal experience in dealing with the conflicting pressures that legislators face. Kennedy took a leave of absence to recover from back surgery, giving him the opportunity to study the topic of political courage. The result,
Profiles in Courage, focuses on the careers of eight Senators whom Kennedy felt had shown great courage under enormous pressure from their parties and their constituents. His own battles with physical pain and his experiences in World War II as a PT boat commander also gave him inspiration.

 
More details

Price HK$ 15,000



The Works of Rudyard Kipling - Signed - Rudyard Kipling

1914-1926 - Doubleday, Garden City - Seven Seas Edition. Number 487 of 1050 limited copies. (The counterpart to the London Bombay Edition)
A handsomely bound complete set of Kipling’s works in twenty-seven volumes, the de luxe issue limited to 1,050 sets, the first volume, Plain Tales from the Hills, is signed by Kipling.

Printed at the Country Life Press, Gardem City, Long Island from Florentine Press type on special hand-made paper with watermark bearing “R [Ganesha device with lotus and swastika] K” on each second leaf.

Including such titles as
Soldiers Three, Kim, The Jungle Book, Captains Courageous, Stalky & Co., Just So Stories, The Five Nations, Plain Tales from the Hills and the Seven Seas 
More details

Price HK$ 45,000



The Karla Trilogy Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy; The Honourable Schoolboy; Smiley s People - Signed - John le Carr

1974 - Hodder and Stoughton, London - First Editions
A signed first edition set of John le Carré’s acclaimed espionage trilogy – Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, The Honourable Schoolboy and Smiley’s People – featuring legendary master spy George Smiley pitted against his elusive Cold War rival, Karla.

In addition to Le Carré signing each book to the title page,
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy includes a signed photograph of Sir Alec Guinness who played the part of Smiley in the original BBC adaptation, considered ‘one of the greatest performances ever seen on the small screen’ by the Guardian newspaper in 2019. The Honourable Schoolboy, includes a card with a typed quote signed by Le Carré.

First edition, first issue of
The Honourable Schoolboy with maps of Hong Kong for endpapers, these where not included in the second issue.

As a secret service agent, Le Carré moved from MI5 to MI6, and was in Berlin when the wall was erected. His experiences inspired him to write a novel which became '
Call For The Dead'; 'When I first began writing, Ian Fleming was riding high and the picture of the spy was that of a character who could have affairs with women, drive a fast car, who used gadgetry and gimmickry to escape.' Le Carré’s aim was to portray the intelligence world from a new view and he has earned a reputation for gritty, realistic, suspenseful spy novels based on a wide knowledge of international espionage or simply human behaviour. His famous recurring character, George Smiley, is an ageing, diffident, shadow-like member of the British foreign service, and the antithesis of James Bond; this trilogy of Smiley books is the author's masterwork, a thrilling elegy for post-imperial Britain. 'Tinker Tailor...' was the basis for the Oscar-nominated 2011 film starring Gary Oldman.

‘Simply the world’s greatest fictional spymaster’
– Newsweek. 
More details

Price HK$ 51,000



1953-1955 - Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick
A handsomely bound nine volume set of the most comprehensive collection to date of Abraham Lincoln’s speeches, letters and notes, together with a one volume index. A massive undertaking by the Abraham Lincoln Association of Springfield, Illinois.

Illustrated with photographs and plates reproducing documents, and engraved portrait frontispiece to volume I
 
More details

Price HK$ 24,000



The Natural - Bernard Malamud

1952 - Harcourt, New York - First Edition
First edition of Bernard Malamud’s first novel, widely considered as one of the greatest baseball narratives of all time, the basis for the acclaimed 1984 film of the same name directed by Barry Levinson, and starring Robert Redford, Glenn Close, Robert Duvall and Kim Basinger.

‘This book established that we could have a serious adult baseball novel by playing with the parallels between mythical elements in the game and mythical elements in literature’. –
Chicago Tribune.

‘A brilliant and unusually fine novel.’ –
The New York Times. 
More details

Price HK$ 16,000



Burgundiae [Burgundy] Comitatus Recentiss. Descriptio D - Abraham Ortelius

1585Antwerpen
A handsome early and large map of Burgundy by the great engraver ad cartographer Abraham Ortelius [map size 36.5 x 50.5 cm], based on the 1563 map of Ferdinand de Lannoy that was suppressed by the Spaniards for political reasons. With place names mainly in French, some in Latin, titles and scale in Latin.

With contemporary hand colouring, and embellished with elaborate strapwork title cartouche and coat of arms. Showing rivers, mountains, forests, fortifications, towns and cities. From Ortelius’ ‘
Theatrum Orbis Terrarum’.

The orientation is from
Oriens or East (top) to Occidens or West (bottom), Septemtrio (the seven stars of Ursa Major) or North (left) to Meridies or South (right).

Finely framed in gilt wood, acid free boarder and backing, and Tru-Vue 98% UV glass [frame size 57 x 71 cm].
 
More details

Price HK$ 15,000



 
Results 33 - 40 of 58 results