The Paper Chase -
John Jay Osborn
1971 - Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston - First Edition
John Jay Osborn’s ‘Paper Chase’ is the story of a young midwesterner, James Hart, who finds himself in the great classrooms of Langdell Hall at Harvard Law School, locked in a zero-sum game with a dominating, omniscient deity: Professor Kingsfield. Osborn wrote this, his first novel, whilst studying at Harvard Law School. It was made into a movie starring John Houseman and Timothy Bottoms. Houseman won an Oscar for his performance as contracts professor Kingsfield, it was also turned into a television series.
Included with this copy is the HUL (News Notes of the Harvard University Library) dated September 1971, it contains a rather critical review of the novel.
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Price HK$ 3,200
1971 - Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston - First Edition
John Jay Osborn’s ‘Paper Chase’ is the story of a young midwesterner, James Hart, who finds himself in the great classrooms of Langdell Hall at Harvard Law School, locked in a zero-sum game with a dominating, omniscient deity: Professor Kingsfield. Osborn wrote this, his first novel, whilst studying at Harvard Law School. It was made into a movie starring John Houseman and Timothy Bottoms. Houseman won an Oscar for his performance as contracts professor Kingsfield, it was also turned into a television series.Included with this copy is the HUL (News Notes of the Harvard University Library) dated September 1971, it contains a rather critical review of the novel.
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Price HK$ 3,200
Life and Writings of Thomas Paine -
Thomas Paine, Daniel Edwin Wheeler (editor)
1908 - Vincent Parke and Company, New York - Independence Edition of the Centenary Issue
‘These are the times that try men's souls’
Elegantly bound ten volume set of the de luxe independence edition, number 166 of just 500 hand-numbered sets signed by the editor Daniel Edwin Wheeler, published to celebrate the centenary of Paine's death.
Included are Paine’s ‘Common Sense’, ‘The American Crises’, ‘The Rights of Man’, and ‘The Age of Reason’, as well as essays, letters and speeches. Each volume with three photogravure or facsimile plates, as well as a frontispiece, title-pages printed in two colours, autographed limitation leaf to volume one.
‘On January 10, 1776, an obscure immigrant published a small pamphlet that ignited independence in America and shifted the political landscape of the patriot movement from reform within the British imperial system to independence from it. One hundred twenty thousand copies sold in the first three months in a nation of three million people, making Common Sense the best-selling printed work by a single author in American history up to that time. Never before had a personally written work appealed to all classes of colonists. Never before had a pamphlet been written in an inspiring style so accessible to the “common” folk of America.’ - Jack Miller Center.
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Price HK$ 35,000
1908 - Vincent Parke and Company, New York - Independence Edition of the Centenary Issue
‘These are the times that try men's souls’Elegantly bound ten volume set of the de luxe independence edition, number 166 of just 500 hand-numbered sets signed by the editor Daniel Edwin Wheeler, published to celebrate the centenary of Paine's death.
Included are Paine’s ‘Common Sense’, ‘The American Crises’, ‘The Rights of Man’, and ‘The Age of Reason’, as well as essays, letters and speeches. Each volume with three photogravure or facsimile plates, as well as a frontispiece, title-pages printed in two colours, autographed limitation leaf to volume one.
‘On January 10, 1776, an obscure immigrant published a small pamphlet that ignited independence in America and shifted the political landscape of the patriot movement from reform within the British imperial system to independence from it. One hundred twenty thousand copies sold in the first three months in a nation of three million people, making Common Sense the best-selling printed work by a single author in American history up to that time. Never before had a personally written work appealed to all classes of colonists. Never before had a pamphlet been written in an inspiring style so accessible to the “common” folk of America.’ - Jack Miller Center.
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Price HK$ 35,000
The Masonic Offering, A Gift for All Seasons. Faith, Hope, Charity. -
Rev. John Perry, Paschal Donaldson (editors)
1854 - Lamport, New York - First Edition
An ornately bound first edition of thus remarkable book featuring a selection of Masonic stories, histories, poems, and guidance, illustrated with eight full page lithographic pates and wonderful chromolithograph (colour) title page.
Scarce in such nice condition.
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Price HK$ 7,500
1854 - Lamport, New York - First Edition
An ornately bound first edition of thus remarkable book featuring a selection of Masonic stories, histories, poems, and guidance, illustrated with eight full page lithographic pates and wonderful chromolithograph (colour) title page.Scarce in such nice condition.
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Price HK$ 7,500
Temple Bar, or Some Account of ye Marygold, No. 1, Fleet Street - Inscribed -
F. G. H. Price
1875 - Printed by Taylor and Francis, London - First Edition
A scarce, fine and inscribed first edition of the history of private banking house of Child & Co., one of the oldest private banks in the United Kingdom, who has traded from No. 1 Fleet Street since 1673, under the ‘Marygold’ sign.
This copy is inscribed from the author, F.G.H. Price to the Marquess of Tavistock, 8th Duke of Bedford, whose family had at that date been banking with Chlid & Co., for two centuries, the first Duke of Bedford opened his account in 1679.
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Price HK$ 3,000
1875 - Printed by Taylor and Francis, London - First Edition
A scarce, fine and inscribed first edition of the history of private banking house of Child & Co., one of the oldest private banks in the United Kingdom, who has traded from No. 1 Fleet Street since 1673, under the ‘Marygold’ sign.This copy is inscribed from the author, F.G.H. Price to the Marquess of Tavistock, 8th Duke of Bedford, whose family had at that date been banking with Chlid & Co., for two centuries, the first Duke of Bedford opened his account in 1679.
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Price HK$ 3,000
The History of the World, in Five Books -
Sir Walter Raleigh, John Shirley
1677 - Printed for Robert White, London - Tenth Folio Edition
Magnificently bound folio, the first to contain the additional ‘Life of the Author’. Illustrated with the memorable engraved allegorical frontispiece, engraved portrait of Raleigh, six double page engraved maps, two double page engraved battle plans, three in-text schematics, twenty-six pages of chronological tables, and a title page printed in red and black.
‘Among the noblest of literary enterprises. Throughout it breathes a serious moral purpose. It illustrates the sureness with which ruin overtakes "great conquerors and other troublers of the world" who neglect law, whether human or divine, and it appropriately closes with an apostrophe to death of rarely paralleled sublimity.’
‘Too Saucy in Censuring Princes’ - King James on confiscating all unsold copies and suppressing further sales, several months after publication.
Written whilst imprisoned in the Tower of London from 1603 to 1616 and intended to outline historical events from creation to modern times, drawing on the Bible, Greek mythology, and other sources. Raleigh dedicated it to the young Prince Henry, his patron and supporter who was trying to secure his release from prison. The prince's death in 1612 discouraged Raleigh, and the book ends abruptly with the second Macedonian War instead of continuing through two more volumes as originally intended. Raleigh was released from the Tower in 1616 to lead one final expedition to South America, but his men attacked a Spanish outpost and he was executed upon his return in 1618.
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Price HK$ 25,000
1677 - Printed for Robert White, London - Tenth Folio Edition
Magnificently bound folio, the first to contain the additional ‘Life of the Author’. Illustrated with the memorable engraved allegorical frontispiece, engraved portrait of Raleigh, six double page engraved maps, two double page engraved battle plans, three in-text schematics, twenty-six pages of chronological tables, and a title page printed in red and black.‘Among the noblest of literary enterprises. Throughout it breathes a serious moral purpose. It illustrates the sureness with which ruin overtakes "great conquerors and other troublers of the world" who neglect law, whether human or divine, and it appropriately closes with an apostrophe to death of rarely paralleled sublimity.’
‘Too Saucy in Censuring Princes’ - King James on confiscating all unsold copies and suppressing further sales, several months after publication.
Written whilst imprisoned in the Tower of London from 1603 to 1616 and intended to outline historical events from creation to modern times, drawing on the Bible, Greek mythology, and other sources. Raleigh dedicated it to the young Prince Henry, his patron and supporter who was trying to secure his release from prison. The prince's death in 1612 discouraged Raleigh, and the book ends abruptly with the second Macedonian War instead of continuing through two more volumes as originally intended. Raleigh was released from the Tower in 1616 to lead one final expedition to South America, but his men attacked a Spanish outpost and he was executed upon his return in 1618.
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Price HK$ 25,000
The Works -
Theodore Roosevelt, Hermann Hagedorn (editor), under the Auspices of The Roosevelt Memorial Association
1923-6 - Charles Scribner's Sons, New York - The National Edition
A finely bound twenty volume set of Roosevelt’s works. With additional notes to the beginning of each volume, sometimes biographical sometimes Roosevelt’s own notes.
Roosevelt was an historian, a biographer, a statesman, a hunter, a naturalist, and an orator. His prodigious literary output includes twenty-six books, over a thousand magazine articles, thousands of speeches and letters. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1906, in his position as President of the United States of America and collaborator of various peace treaties.
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Price HK$ 36,000
1923-6 - Charles Scribner's Sons, New York - The National Edition
A finely bound twenty volume set of Roosevelt’s works. With additional notes to the beginning of each volume, sometimes biographical sometimes Roosevelt’s own notes.Roosevelt was an historian, a biographer, a statesman, a hunter, a naturalist, and an orator. His prodigious literary output includes twenty-six books, over a thousand magazine articles, thousands of speeches and letters. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1906, in his position as President of the United States of America and collaborator of various peace treaties.
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Price HK$ 36,000
Baronagium Genealogicum: or the Pedigrees of the English Peers -
Sir William Segar, Joseph Edmondson
1764-84 - Engraved and printed for the author, London - First Editions
The most beautifully illustrated and comprehensive record of 18th century Heraldry. A magnificent and extremely rare complete set of six enormous uncut folio volumes, with 658 copperplate engravings (104 of which are double page) many by the master engraver Francesco Bartolozzi a founder member of the Royal Academy. The plates consist of 279 coats-of-arms (3 double-page), 364 genealogical tables (101 double-page), six titles, six dedication pages, and three specific family dedication pages.
Ranked to begin with Royalty, this massive work took 20 years to produce, making it necessary to publish a supplement with new peerages. Provenance - Sir John Smith, Bart., F.R.S. of Sydling St.Nicholas, Dorset, whose initials JS are gilt-stamped to the morocco spine labels and engraved bookplates to the front pastedowns.
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Price HK$ 150,000
1764-84 - Engraved and printed for the author, London - First Editions
The most beautifully illustrated and comprehensive record of 18th century Heraldry. A magnificent and extremely rare complete set of six enormous uncut folio volumes, with 658 copperplate engravings (104 of which are double page) many by the master engraver Francesco Bartolozzi a founder member of the Royal Academy. The plates consist of 279 coats-of-arms (3 double-page), 364 genealogical tables (101 double-page), six titles, six dedication pages, and three specific family dedication pages.Ranked to begin with Royalty, this massive work took 20 years to produce, making it necessary to publish a supplement with new peerages. Provenance - Sir John Smith, Bart., F.R.S. of Sydling St.Nicholas, Dorset, whose initials JS are gilt-stamped to the morocco spine labels and engraved bookplates to the front pastedowns.
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Price HK$ 150,000
The Jungle -
Upton Sinclair
1906 - Doubleday, New York - First Edition
‘Pierces the thickest skull and most leathery heart.’ - Winston Churchill
‘The brutally grim story of a Slavic family who emigrates to America, The Jungle tells of their rapid and inexorable descent into numbing poverty, moral degradation, and social and economic despair.
‘Sinclair's nightmarish narrative of the immigrant Rudken family instigated a series of legislative measures that were highly successful. His lurid scenes of a meat packing industry that ground both rates and fingers into sausage aroused the middle class to demand sanitary conditions for food preparation.
Yet far less effective by comparison was his severe indictment of the working conditions that regularly reduced laborers to impoverished insanity. As Sinclair later wryly observed, “I aimed for the heart and hit the stomach of America”.’ – Emory Elliot, The Columbia Literary History of the United States.
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Price HK$ 9,400
1906 - Doubleday, New York - First Edition
‘Pierces the thickest skull and most leathery heart.’ - Winston Churchill‘The brutally grim story of a Slavic family who emigrates to America, The Jungle tells of their rapid and inexorable descent into numbing poverty, moral degradation, and social and economic despair.
‘Sinclair's nightmarish narrative of the immigrant Rudken family instigated a series of legislative measures that were highly successful. His lurid scenes of a meat packing industry that ground both rates and fingers into sausage aroused the middle class to demand sanitary conditions for food preparation.
Yet far less effective by comparison was his severe indictment of the working conditions that regularly reduced laborers to impoverished insanity. As Sinclair later wryly observed, “I aimed for the heart and hit the stomach of America”.’ – Emory Elliot, The Columbia Literary History of the United States.
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Price HK$ 9,400