E-List: Firsts, London

A small selection of books, not yet cataloged, available to see at Firsts London at the Saatchi Gallery 15-18 September. For free admission please contact us to have tickets left at the door.

To order something or make an inquiry, please email us or use the website contact form. Additionally, for more photos, online purchasing and current availability of specific books please click here.

Audebert, Jean Baptiste

Historie Naturelle des Singes and Makis (Paris [Desray], 1797-[1800])

£13,500

1st edition of Audebert’s first original work, the only one published in his lifetime using his name and the first illustrated monograph devoted to primates. 2 volumes in large folio, half title, list of subscribers and 61 engraved plates printed in color and finished by hand, two uncolored anatomical plates. Contemporary boards, rebacked recornered in tan calf. Some soiling and spotting to the margins of the plates and light damp-staining to the outer edge of a few plates, else a very good copy of a beautifully illustrated book.

Burke, Kenneth [and] Thurber, James, White, E. B., Wilson, Edmund [and] 9 others.

Whither, Whither, or after Sex, What? A Symposium to End Symposium (NY [Macaulay], 1930).

£700

1st edition. Fine in a near fine dustjacket, fresh as a fountain soda. Black cloth, one of 2 bindings with no priority, despite guesses from Bowden D7a, since both were sold on publication day. But only our jacket is the 1st printing, and it is notoriously rare (go find another) because it was replaced almost immediately with a meeker, plainer jacket. Witty essays on the future that are dryer than Lawrence of Arabia. They’re aimed at sex, love, and 10 other, less alluring subjects, and though we have all heard words of love it also has softer sounds like snaps, buttons, hooks, belts, and zippers.

Cholmondeley, Mary

A Devotee (London [Edward Arnold], 1897).

£2750

1st edition. Original cloth, trifling rubs (lighter than a cat’s footfall), a fine copy (valor procures, care preserves). Inscribed “With Mary’s Love, March 10th ’97” on a paper slip contemporaneously laid down on the front free endpaper (she sent the slip to the publisher, then the book with the slip was sent from them, reportedly, to her brother). OCLC locates 21 copies of the 1st edition but ABPC lists no auction sales since 1975 (copies may have been sold lotted and hence not recorded), and this is the only presentation copy of any of her books I recall seeing, or even hearing about. Coll: 8vo. pp. [1–9] 10–211 [212–224 (ads)]. Ref: Sadleir 54. Wolff 1211.

Dumas, Alexandre.

Vingt Ans Après (Brussels [Alph. Lebègue], 1845).

£2,250

8 vols. in 2, all vols. dated 1845. The text was copied directly from the serialization published in Le Siècle from Jan. to Aug. 1845, and the first 4 Brussels editions all precede Baudry’s Paris edition. Munro lists our edition 3rd after the editions of Hauman and Meline but priority remains unsure (the open question is who published their last volume first, thus completing publication, the definition of the 1st edition). Publication of all 3 editions was completed in August, and because Lebègue published the real 1st edition of Les Trois Mousquetaires’ he was motivated to get his edition (the sequel) of it to market first, and may have succeeded, but we won’t argue Munro’s priority here and now. Contemporary boards and paper labels worn at the corners and along the joints, former owners’ inscriptions on the flyleaves, minor stains to 5 pages, else good condition, lacks the ads but otherwise complete with all half–titles, and the chapter Le bonhomme Broussel (pages 81–90 in vol. III), which was suppressed from the Paris edition.

Du Maurier, Daphne

Rebecca (London [Gollancz], 1939)

£30,000

1st edition, signed in ink on the title page by Du Maurier. Black cloth stamped in gilt, corners lightly bumped, some minor rubbing to the front panel, foxed and toned text block and endpapers (normal with this book), small morocco bookplate to the front pastedown and a very small booksellers ticket on the rear pastedown, else an internally clean and near fine copy. In the increasingly scarce dust jacket with the original, always scarce, Book Society bellyband. Spine of jacket is faded a half shade, extremities with minimal toning and wear, light crease to the back panel, else very good or better and unrestored. Bellyband torn along the spine area and some wear, else without loss and similarly bright. Old full cloth box.

A classic masterpiece that subtly subverts the Cinderella, rags to riches theme providing an eerie Gothic narrative. The atmospheric dream described in the opening scene gives a sonorous clue to the grim reality found in the last chapter. The primary characters include the nameless heroine, her introverted husband Maxim de Winter who suffers from an old case of estrogen poisoning, their housekeeper the obsessive Mrs. Danvers, the house, Manderley, a gothic incarnation of grandeur in the modern style and the former wife of de Winter, the now deceased Rebecca who haunts them all and gives her name to the title.

There are dozens of great thrillers in 20th century western literature but at the pinnacle of fame there is only one Rebecca and this is the optimum copy of it. "He did not look at me, he went on reading his paper, contented, comfortable, having assumed his way of living, the master of the house. And as I sat there, brooding, my chin in my hands, fondling the soft ears of one of the spaniels, it came to me that I was not the first one to lounge there in possession of the chair; someone had been before me, had surely left an imprint of her person on the cushions, and on the arm where her hand had rested. Another one had poured the coffee from that same silver coffee pot, had placed the cup to her lips, had bent down to the dog, even as I was doing."

Freud, Sigmund

Über den Ursprung der hinteren Nervenwurzeln im Rückenmark von Ammocoetes (Petromyzon Planeri) (Wien [E.K. Hof], 1877)

£1,300

1st edition of Freud’s first published paper in the original publisher’s blue printed wrappers. Pages 15-27 with one folding plate after Freud by F. Schima, contained in the complete issue of Sitzungsberichte der der Kaiserlichen-Akademie der Wissenschaften. Mathematisch - NaturwissenschaftlichenClasse. LXXV. Band. III. Abtheilung. Jahrgang 1877. Heft I bis V. General light wear to the extremities and the top, loss to spine ends, old piece of tape to the inner front wrapper, minimal sporadic foxing throughout, occasional short tears to outter margins (none touching text), else a very good, unrestored copy that is uncut and largely unopened.

This is Freud’s second piece of student reaserch while at at the Institute of Psysiology in Vienna, to which he had been admitted the previous fall. The paper concerns the study of Reissner cells in the spinal cord of the Petromyzon Planeri (European Brook Lamprey).

Norman F1; Grinstein 37.

Hilton, James​​​ ​

Lost Horizon (London [ Macmillan], 1933).

£12,800

1st edition. Fine in original cloth, with a former owner’s bookplate signed by Hilton loosely inserted and near fine dustjacket with minor wear to the extremities; a fresh and superior copy. Custom half calf box. ​

Every thought is an afterthought, but Lost Horizon is the single most celebrated modern utopia, and more than that, one of the best known and worldly famous novels written in the 20th century. Among other knowing inventions, the book opens with what is surely fiction's first skyjacking, reveals a profound ideal of moderation and contemplation, argues for a broad and particularly appealing spiritual vision not at that time well understood in the west but now embraced widely in our culture ("Many religions are moderately true," says the Abbot of Shangri-La), and with all that, Lost Horizon provides a thought provoking cerebral encounter and maintains a level of suspense usually found only in the finest mysteries. Destined to be a classic, still in print 200 years hence, as the message is a solemn one, predicting the perils of war to all civilizations save those that are too secret to be found or too humble to be noticed.

Kafka, Franz​​​​​​​​​ ​

The Trial (London [Gollancz], 1937).

£3,250

1st edition in English, preceding Knopf’s American edition. First and last few pages, the page edges and extreme marginsfoxed (the rest is ok), near fine in a dustjacket that is 1/8” short along the top (maybe miscut or maybe trimmed), faded to tan on the spine and with 2 darker tan spots, else very good, nice looking, never repaired, real as a heart attack, and priced to more than compensate for its failings. Half morocco case. A giant of 20th century literature. The last auction sale was $7,500 for one in a repaired jacket (Sotheby’s, Sep. 17, 2021).

​“…without having done anything wrong, he [Josef K.] was arrested…”

​​​​​​​ –Kafka, The Trial (the first sentence)

So, Josef K., the reader, and the narrator, do not know why he was arrested. And though he is found guilty, and executed, he, and we, never find out. And why? Because this literary coupis so transfixing that why is incidental and, by the end, doesn’t really matter.

Lawrence, D. H.

Lady Chatterley's Lover (Florence, 1928).

£7,500

1st edition (in English). Number 302 of 1,000 signed. Slight wear at corners and the base of the spine else near fine.

Chatterley triples with Ulysses and Tropic of Cancer as the seminal suppressed books from the first half of the 20th century, all 3 lecturing that chastity is just an unlit lamp, and adult abstinence ranks as a purity alongside of malnutrition. Now the fashion has evolved, and even thinness is preferred to decorum, so we idolize malnutrition and directs abstinence at carbohydrates. Lawrence’s novel is a brazen, heated, and dexterously written one of earnest literary merit, turning on a woman’s thorny feelings for her gardener (better to copulate than never), her realization that propriety is insufficient temptation (your sins are my experiments) and that scandal is the compassionate allowance the happy make to the puritans. Too hot for some, Lawrence’s typist quit after the 5th chapter. Aldous Huxley’s wife finished it, with part payment on page 85, a plug for the soon to be published Brave New World,

“Olive was reading a book about the future, when babies would be bred in bottles and women would be immunized.”

Early critics shrieked and grunted so loudly you’d have thought they’d caught their finger in a car door. They dragged the book into court where it was banned by aging male judges who believed that single women wore tweed nightgowns and forgot that the word tongue is feminine in Spanish, German, French, Italian, Greek, and Latin, and of course those judges were personally threatened by the idea that a wife with a non–performing husband might seek a sexual encounter outside her marriage. By the 1960s the book was seen as tame, and by the end of the century, rational fears of being ostracized for private sex were negated, and everyone was cheating on everyone, turning the whole world into Fleetwood Mac, an indication of some sort, that if you cultivate your vices when you are young, they will not forsake you when you are old. And here’s my tao about happiness. If you want to be happy for an hour, smoke some grass. If you want to be happy for a month, fall in love. If you want to be happy forever, take up book collecting.

Lem, Stanislaw ​​ ​

Solaris (Warsaw [Widawnictwo…], 1961)

£1,050

1st edition (in Polish), preceding all others. Printed wrappers with a small strip of toning to the bottom edge and a light crease to the front upper corner, else near fine in a bright dust jacket with skillful and small restorations along the upper extremities, but very little of the typical rubbing.

Solaris is considered among the most significant science fiction novels of the second half of the twentieth century. The novel is about an entity that encompasses the entire planet Solaris as a type of ocean and the attempts of humans to communicate with it. The efforts fail, instead revealing only the internalized guilt, trauma, and psychological immaturity of the scientists. First printed in English in 1970 based on the 1964 French translation (a 2011 translation from the Polish is much better). Solaris has been filmed three times. Anatomy of Wonder II-661.

Neurath, Otto.

International Picture Language (London [Psyche Miniatures], 1936).

£3,500

1st edition in English, 1st printing with the fold out table. Original clothbacked boards, paper label, 2/6 not overstamped (as is usually the case). A few spots to back cover, otherwise near fine, a scarce and fragile book, and one of commanding impact.

I don’t think I have to hype Neurath’s book much, just pick it up and look at the pictures. This guy invented these, a visual language, symbolically representing quantitative information via easily interpretable icons, now taken for granted.

Rossetti, Dante Gabriel

Poems (London [F.S. Ellis], 1870).

£5,200

1st edition. 1 of 12 (maybe 13) on fine paper in an unrecorded binding of the publisher’s blue paper boards, white paper spine with no label. Top edge rough trimmed, other edges uncut. Front hinge split but holding, top and bottom edge of the spine perished, some scuffs and stains to the boards and wear to extremities. Ownership signature to front free endpaper, toning to the pastedowns and endpapers., else very good. Unrestored. Custom cloth box.

12 copies of Poems were printed on fine paper (watermark JW II) with a cloth binding designed by Rossetti, specifically intended for author presentation. Then an additional 25 were printed on large paper and bound in blue paper boards like this copy, which, according to Thomas Wise (Ashley IV 131-132), were sold, not held for the author. We can’t say for sure where this copy came from—it could have been a sample or trial copy, left over sheets subsequently bound by the publisher, or something else entirely. Whatever it was, it is now a rare and bibliographically interesting copy of Rossetti’s most significant work.

Voltaire, François Marie Arouet

Candide, ou l’Optimisme, traduit de l’allemand de Mr. le Docteur Ralph (Genève [Cramer], 1759).

£16,800

1st edition of the great eighteenth century philosophical narrative. Duodecimo, in contemporary French molted calf, gilt ruled, decorated spine, red calf label, marbled endpapers. Rebacked with the original spine partially preserved, recornered, inner hinges skillfully repaired, old ink signatures on the front blanks, signature and pen mark to the title page, tissue repaired tear to the bottom margin of A2 touching the bottom 3 lines of text, this copy is bound without N7-N8 a blank and a notice to the binder (only a few known examples were bound with those pages), else internally clean and over-all good.

True first edition of, what was once considered very rare, but is less so now that there is a clear and accepted bibliography. There were 18 edition of Candide in 1759, but only four of them have 299 pages (as this copy). The first has the following points: title ornament of fruit and flowers repeated at pages 193 and 266; on page 103, line 4 there is a misprint of “que ce ce fut” (later corrected); page 125, line 4, has “précisément” (corrected in later editions); with revisions on page 3 removing a paragraph break, and on page 41 , where several short sentences about the Lisbon earthquake were rewritten. The first edition does not have cancelled paragraph on page 242 criticizing German poets (beginning “Candide était affligé”) which survives in the London edition.

Over the last decade several first editions that weren’t originally on the small census have come to market, but Candide is still scarce and more so in a contemporary binding.

Bound with Candide, ou l’Otimisme, Seconde Partie (1761), likely written by Henri-Joseph Dulaurens, AND Remercîment de Candide à Mr. de Voltaire (Halle [Schneider], 1760), attributed to Louis-Olivier de Marconnay. Neither title is rare or significant, but it is not common to see separate editions bound with a first edition of Candide (they were often printed following in some later editions of Candide).

Woolf, Virginia

Orlando: A Biography (London [The Hogarth Press], 1928).

£3,350

1st trade edition of Woolf’s homage to her friend and lover, Vita Sackville-West, preceded by the deluxe issue 9 days earlier. Orange cloth with some minor bumps to the front edges, else near fine in a dust jacket with chipping to the extremities, a 4cm tear to the rear panel, general dustiness and three old tape repairs to the top and bottom spine edges, else very good.

The eponymous character whose life spans 400 years, changes sex as an adult, and relishes in challenging centuries of English literary and political forms is modeled heavily on Sackville-West and, at its core, Orlando, is a love letter to her from Woolf.