Search results
-
JACOMB, Charles Ernest.
And a New Earth. A Romance.
London, George Routledge & Sons, 1926.
First edition of this post-apocalyptic fantasy novel relating the history of a utopian island that survived a ‘second flood’ in 1958, which destroyed the world’s civilization and reduced the human population to just ten thousand.
£75
-
MOSZKOWSKI, Alexander.
[H.J. STENNING, translator.] The Isles of Wisdom.
London, George Routledge & sons, 1924.
First English edition of Alexander Moszkowski’s dystopian satire, an imagined visit to a series of southeast Asian islands which each subscribe unreservedly to a different philosophical school of thought.
£230
-
GOETHE, Johann Wolfgang von.
Stella. Ein Schauspiel für Liebende in fünf Akten.
Berlin, August Mylius, 1776.
First edition, scarce, of Goethe’s early play about a man caught between his love for two women, which ends with reconciliation and a mariage à trois.
£1800
-
GIORDANO, Vito.
Il giudice di se stesso.
Naples, Gaetano Tardano, 1793.
Second edition of the first work (first 1792) and first edition of the second, both very rare, containing philosophical, theological, and legal meditations by the Neapolitan lawyer and judge Vito Giordano, featuring abstract, dreamlike ‘flights of fancy’ set both on earth and in heaven.
£450
-
ANDERSEN, Hendrik Christian.
Création d’un centre mondial de communication.
Paris, 1913.
First French editions of both parts of this ambitious urban planning project envisioning a utopian world capital, in which art and architecture would function as vehicles of world peace.
£2250
-
FERDOWSĪ.
Shāhnāmah.
Tehran, Amir Kabir, AH 1350 [AD 1971].
A lavishly-produced edition of the Shāhnāmah (or Shahnameh), rare in the dustjacket, one of a thousand copies printed to mark the 2500th anniversary of the founding of the Persian Empire.
£4000
-
BEAUMONT, Joseph.
Psyche: or Loves Mysterie in XX. Canto’s: displaying the Intercourse betwixt Christ and the Soule …
London, Printed by John Dawson for George Boddington, 1648.
First edition of this lengthy religious epic representing the journey of the personified Soul from England to the Holy Land and back, written by Beaumont, one of the Royalist fellows ejected from Cambridge in 1644.
£1250
-
BARTHOLOMEW OF PISA.
Sermo[n]es lucidissimi et insignes dubiorum et casuum, co[n]scientialium co[n]te[m]ptivi et elucidativi sup[er]...
Lyon, Romain Morin, 3 February 1519.
Rare edition of forty-five sermons for Lent and Easter by the Franciscan friar Bartholomew of Pisa (d. c. 1401), printed in Lyon by Romain Morin.
£2250
-
BONNARD, Camille Marie.
Le pélerin, ou souvenirs de Rome. Tome premier [all published].
Paris, Camille Bonnard, 1829.
Rare first and only edition of this handsomely illustrated work on Rome by the French painter and engraver Camille Bonnard (1794–1870), with his autograph presentation note pasted inside.
£1500
-
‘CODACCI, Scarpafico’, pseud. [i.e. Gaetano VERACI.]
Cicalata sopra la coda in forma di lettera indirizzata alla Signora N.N....
[Florence,] ‘nel Campo Cauditano’, 1765.
First edition of this highly suggestive, mock-academic ode to the ‘tail’, dedicated to an anonymous lady on the birth of a son.
£550
-
[DUQUESNE, Arnaud-Bernard d’Icard.]
Vie de la vénérable mère Catherine de Bar, dite en religion Mecthilde du S. Sacrement,...
Nancy, Claude-Sigisbert Lamort; Paris, Le Berton and Herissant, 1775.
Uncommon biography of the French nun Mechtilde of the Blessed Sacrament (née Catherine de Bar, 1614-1698), founder of the order of Benedictine Nuns of Perpetual Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, by the French theologian Arnaud-Bernard d’Icard Duquesne (1732-1791). Most copies lack the frontispiece...
£650
-
[MAISTRE, Xavier de.]
Voyage autour de ma chambre par M. le Chev. X*** *** O. A. S. D. S. M. S. [Officier au service de Sa Majesté...
Turin, 1794 [Lausanne, Isaac Hignou, 1795].
First edition, rare, of the celebrated fantasy novel Voyage Around My Room, a parody of the grand travel narrative tradition, written by Xavier de Maistre (1763–1852), a Savoyard officer in the army of the Kingdom of Piedmont–Sardinia, during the forty-two days he spent in solitary confinement...
£2800
-
GIOVIO, Paolo.
Historiarum sui temporis. Tomus primus … ex Italico Latinus factus …
Lyon, heirs of Sébastien Gryphe, 1561.
The first Lyon pocket edition of Giovio’s history of his own time, in a charming gilt limp vellum binding.
£350
-
[GIRALDI, Giovanni Battista.]
Giuditio sopra la tragedia di Canace et Macareo con molte utili considerationi circa l’arte tragica,...
(Colophon:) Lucca, Vincenzo Busdraghi, 4 May 1550.
First edition of this criticism, in the form of a dialogue, of Speroni’s play Canace et Macareo, which sparked one of the most remarkable literary debates of the time. The text was previously attributed to Bartolomeo Cavalcanti, but the authorship of Giraldi is now generally accepted. The full text...
£650
-
HERMOGENES.
Τεχνη ρητορικη τελειοτατη. Hermogenis ars oratoria absolutissima, et libri omnes. Cum nova versione...
Geneva, Pierre Aubert, 1614.
A parallel text edition of Hermogenes in a simple but fine contemporary binding.
£750
-
[JUVENILE.]
The Weasel Family.
London, Edinburgh, and New York, T. Nelson and Sons, [1860s?]
First edition, rare, of a rather charming Victorian picture-book, from ‘The Funny Animal Series’, later collected in Comical Creatures: a Picture Book for the Nursery (1868).
£375
-
[MISSAL.]
Ordinaire de la Messe.
[Paris?, c. 1890–1900].
A lithographed and elegantly hand-coloured French Missal in the style of a medieval manuscript.
£350
-
[PLAYING CARDS.]
Complete deck of 52 playing cards with harlequin design.
London, Hunt’s Playing Card Manufacturing Co. Ltd., c. 1880.
A lovely and well-preserved complete deck of playing cards by Hunt’s Playing Card Manufacturing Company, with a sumptuous design featuring a double-ended harlequin on a gold background.
£175
-
[RAGUENEAU DE LA CHAINAYE, Armand Henri.]
Ivrogniana, ou bons mots et aventures d’ivrognes, recueil de cabaret, suite de Grivoisiana,...
Paris, chez Madame Cavanagh, an. XII – 1804.
Scarce collection of comic anecdotes and verse on wine and drunkenness compiled by Armand Henri Ragueneau de La Chainaye (1777–1850) and published by Madame Cavanagh.
£550
-
TACITUS, Publius Cornelius; N. S. SMITH, translator.
Dissertation on the Manners of the Germans, and the Life of Agricola … translated...
London, George and William Budd Whittaker, 1821.
First edition, a seemingly unrecorded issue of this bilingual edition of Tacitus’ Germania and Agricola, a subscription copy uncut in publisher’s boards.
£600