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Pride and Prejudice. A Novel -
Jane Austen
1833 - Richard Bentley, London - First illustrated edition & first single volume edition.
A finely bound ‘Pride and Prejudice’, the first Bentley edition, the first edition in one volume, and the first to be illustrated.
Written when Jane Austen was just twenty-one, but revised for publication anonymously thirteen years later. Elizabeth Bennet, eligible bachelor Fitzwilliam Darcy, his friend Bingley and her beloved sister Jane, the folly of judging by first impressions, the friendships, gossip and snobberies of provincial middle-class life.
Illustrated with an engraved frontispiece and additional vignette title-page engraved by William Greatbatch after drawings by George Pickering.
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Price HK$ 50,000
1833 - Richard Bentley, London - First illustrated edition & first single volume edition.
A finely bound ‘Pride and Prejudice’, the first Bentley edition, the first edition in one volume, and the first to be illustrated.Written when Jane Austen was just twenty-one, but revised for publication anonymously thirteen years later. Elizabeth Bennet, eligible bachelor Fitzwilliam Darcy, his friend Bingley and her beloved sister Jane, the folly of judging by first impressions, the friendships, gossip and snobberies of provincial middle-class life.
Illustrated with an engraved frontispiece and additional vignette title-page engraved by William Greatbatch after drawings by George Pickering.
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Price HK$ 50,000
A Portfolio of Drawings Illustrating Salome by Oscar Wilde -
Aubrey Beardsley
1912 - John Lane, London
Aubrey Beardsley was just 21 years old when he produced the drawings for Oscar Wilde's play Salome. They were first published in The Studio magazine in 1893. These illustrations launched Beardsley from obscurity to international fame almost overnight. More importantly, they marked the beginning of a new era in the arts: these are commonly held to be the first works to develop an Art Nouveau style.
This scarce portfolio contains sixteen large black and white plates of the Salome illustrations, together with a separate list of plates, all printed on Japanese vellum, and loose as issued [plates size 34.2 x 26.9 cm]. Without the ‘Design for Title Page’ plate.
Housed in publisher's portfolio of half cream vellum over olive green paper boards, front panel titled in gilt ‘Aubrey Beardsley’s Illustrations to Salome’ and with the Beardsley designed rose-bush motif from the 1894 edition blocked in rose gold.
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Price HK$ 12,000
1912 - John Lane, London
Aubrey Beardsley was just 21 years old when he produced the drawings for Oscar Wilde's play Salome. They were first published in The Studio magazine in 1893. These illustrations launched Beardsley from obscurity to international fame almost overnight. More importantly, they marked the beginning of a new era in the arts: these are commonly held to be the first works to develop an Art Nouveau style.This scarce portfolio contains sixteen large black and white plates of the Salome illustrations, together with a separate list of plates, all printed on Japanese vellum, and loose as issued [plates size 34.2 x 26.9 cm]. Without the ‘Design for Title Page’ plate.
Housed in publisher's portfolio of half cream vellum over olive green paper boards, front panel titled in gilt ‘Aubrey Beardsley’s Illustrations to Salome’ and with the Beardsley designed rose-bush motif from the 1894 edition blocked in rose gold.
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Price HK$ 12,000
Advice from a Lady of Quality to her Children -
Louis-Antoine Caraccioli, Samuel Glasse (translator)
1778 - Printed by R. Raikes and Sold by J. F. and C. Rivington, Glocester - First Edition in English
An extremely rare first edition of this 18th century ‘Tuesdays With Morrie’, first published in 1769 as ’Les adieux de la Maréchale de *** à ses enfants’. Two pretty little volumes In 18th century full calf bindings.
A popular courtesy book written in a series of twenty one ‘conferences’ held between mother, her daughter and sons. Topics covered during these conferences include Virtue, Pride, Generosity, Female Conduct, Friendship, Love of Truth, Brotherly Love, Study, Pleasure, Ambition, Vanity, Relative Duty, Patriotism, Social Duties.
Unlike most courtesy books, Caraccioli's has the semblance of a plot and reads somewhat like a novel, which ends with the death of the main character. Advice from a Lady went through numerous later editions in England and America.
The Translator, Samuel Glasse, dedicates this work to Queen Charlotte (1744-1818), consort of King George III of Great Britain.
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Price HK$ 11,000
1778 - Printed by R. Raikes and Sold by J. F. and C. Rivington, Glocester - First Edition in English
An extremely rare first edition of this 18th century ‘Tuesdays With Morrie’, first published in 1769 as ’Les adieux de la Maréchale de *** à ses enfants’. Two pretty little volumes In 18th century full calf bindings.A popular courtesy book written in a series of twenty one ‘conferences’ held between mother, her daughter and sons. Topics covered during these conferences include Virtue, Pride, Generosity, Female Conduct, Friendship, Love of Truth, Brotherly Love, Study, Pleasure, Ambition, Vanity, Relative Duty, Patriotism, Social Duties.
Unlike most courtesy books, Caraccioli's has the semblance of a plot and reads somewhat like a novel, which ends with the death of the main character. Advice from a Lady went through numerous later editions in England and America.
The Translator, Samuel Glasse, dedicates this work to Queen Charlotte (1744-1818), consort of King George III of Great Britain.
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Price HK$ 11,000
The Complete Works -
Lewis Carroll, [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson]
1939 - The Nonesuch Press, London - First Nonesuch Edition
A finely bound volume of Lewis Carroll’s works.
Includes: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland; Through the Looking Glass; Sylvie and Bruno; Sylvie and Bruno Concluded; The Hunting of The Snark; Puzzles From Wonderland; Phantasmagoria; Acrostics, Verse, Stories and A Miscellany.
The two Alice titles are illustrated with John Tenniel’s original drawings, and the book begins with an introduction by Alexander Woollcott.
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Price HK$ 6,000
1939 - The Nonesuch Press, London - First Nonesuch Edition
A finely bound volume of Lewis Carroll’s works.Includes: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland; Through the Looking Glass; Sylvie and Bruno; Sylvie and Bruno Concluded; The Hunting of The Snark; Puzzles From Wonderland; Phantasmagoria; Acrostics, Verse, Stories and A Miscellany.
The two Alice titles are illustrated with John Tenniel’s original drawings, and the book begins with an introduction by Alexander Woollcott.
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Price HK$ 6,000
The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club -
Charles Dickens, Hablot Knight Browne “Phiz”, Robert Seymour (Illustrators)
1837 - Chapman and Hall, London - First Edition, Mixed Issue
First edition, in contemporary binding, possibly the publisher’s deluxe binding, bound from the original parts. Illustrated with 43 engraved plates, nine by Robert Seymour, and the balance including the frontispiece and engraved title page, by Hablot Knight Browne.
‘The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club’ was the first novel by Charles Dickens, initially serialised from March 1836 to November 1837. ‘A comic masterpiece that catapulted its twenty-four-year-old author to immediate fame. Readers were captivated by the adventures of the poet Snodgrass, the sportsman Winkle and, above all, by that quintessentially English Quixote, Mr Pickwick, and his cockney Sancho Panza, Sam Weller. From the hallowed turf of Dingley Dell Cricket Club to the unholy fracas of the Eatanswill election.’
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Price HK$ 19,000
1837 - Chapman and Hall, London - First Edition, Mixed Issue
First edition, in contemporary binding, possibly the publisher’s deluxe binding, bound from the original parts. Illustrated with 43 engraved plates, nine by Robert Seymour, and the balance including the frontispiece and engraved title page, by Hablot Knight Browne.‘The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club’ was the first novel by Charles Dickens, initially serialised from March 1836 to November 1837. ‘A comic masterpiece that catapulted its twenty-four-year-old author to immediate fame. Readers were captivated by the adventures of the poet Snodgrass, the sportsman Winkle and, above all, by that quintessentially English Quixote, Mr Pickwick, and his cockney Sancho Panza, Sam Weller. From the hallowed turf of Dingley Dell Cricket Club to the unholy fracas of the Eatanswill election.’
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Price HK$ 19,000
The Novels of F. Dostoevsky -
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky [Dostoyevsky], Constance Garnett (translator)
1949-1951 - William Heinemann, London
A finely bound twelve volume set of Dostoevsky’s novels and short story collections, first translated by Constance Garnett between 1912 and 1920, and now difficult to assemble in this format.
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Price HK$ 32,000
1949-1951 - William Heinemann, London
A finely bound twelve volume set of Dostoevsky’s novels and short story collections, first translated by Constance Garnett between 1912 and 1920, and now difficult to assemble in this format.
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Price HK$ 32,000
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes -
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
1892 - George Newnes Ltd., London - First Edition
A smart bright and thus scarce first edition, first issue of Doyle’s first and classic short story collection, twelve in total including A Scandal in Bohemia, introducing Irene Adler and The Speckled Band. These legendary Sherlock Holmes stories all initially appeared in The Strand Magazine, the year before.
Magnificently illustrated throughout from wood engravings by Sidney Paget.
When the publisher Newnes accepted a Doyle piece for the very first issue in 1891, he did so with the hope that it would provide him access, through Doyle's agent, to another writer in the agent's stable - Rudyard Kipling - but then beginning in the very first year, "Sherlock Holmes" took off and The Strand was a phenomenal success.
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Price HK$ 45,000
1892 - George Newnes Ltd., London - First Edition
A smart bright and thus scarce first edition, first issue of Doyle’s first and classic short story collection, twelve in total including A Scandal in Bohemia, introducing Irene Adler and The Speckled Band. These legendary Sherlock Holmes stories all initially appeared in The Strand Magazine, the year before.Magnificently illustrated throughout from wood engravings by Sidney Paget.
When the publisher Newnes accepted a Doyle piece for the very first issue in 1891, he did so with the hope that it would provide him access, through Doyle's agent, to another writer in the agent's stable - Rudyard Kipling - but then beginning in the very first year, "Sherlock Holmes" took off and The Strand was a phenomenal success.
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Price HK$ 45,000
An Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard -
Thomas Gray
1869 - Sampson Low, London
‘Full many a Gem of purest Ray serene
The dark unfathom'd Caves of Ocean Bear:
Full many a Flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its Sweetness on the desert Air.’
A finely bound and illustrated edition of Thomas Gray’s ‘Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard’, one of the most widely-quoted poems of the 18th century. It is a meditation on the inevitability of death; the vanity of ambition and the universal human desire to be loved. In particular the poem looks at death as a leveller, an indiscriminate force which makes no distinction between the famous on the one hand and, on the other, the anonymous – those who, in the words of the poem:
Far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife
Their sober wishes never learn’d to stray
‘Widely considered his masterpiece, it is believed that Gray wrote the 'Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard' in the graveyard of the church in Stoke Poges, Buckinghamshire in 1751. The poem was a literary sensation when published by Robert Dodsley in February 1751 and has made a lasting contribution to English literature’
With sixteen colour chromolithograph illustrations from drawings by R. Barnes, R. P. Leitch, E. M. Wimperis and others, each with descriptive tissue guards, and two leaves of the original manuscript in facsimile.
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Price HK$ 9,000
1869 - Sampson Low, London
‘Full many a Gem of purest Ray sereneThe dark unfathom'd Caves of Ocean Bear:
Full many a Flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its Sweetness on the desert Air.’
A finely bound and illustrated edition of Thomas Gray’s ‘Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard’, one of the most widely-quoted poems of the 18th century. It is a meditation on the inevitability of death; the vanity of ambition and the universal human desire to be loved. In particular the poem looks at death as a leveller, an indiscriminate force which makes no distinction between the famous on the one hand and, on the other, the anonymous – those who, in the words of the poem:
Far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife
Their sober wishes never learn’d to stray
‘Widely considered his masterpiece, it is believed that Gray wrote the 'Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard' in the graveyard of the church in Stoke Poges, Buckinghamshire in 1751. The poem was a literary sensation when published by Robert Dodsley in February 1751 and has made a lasting contribution to English literature’
With sixteen colour chromolithograph illustrations from drawings by R. Barnes, R. P. Leitch, E. M. Wimperis and others, each with descriptive tissue guards, and two leaves of the original manuscript in facsimile.
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Price HK$ 9,000