All

FIRST UK EDITION, translated from the French by Beckett.  “Voted the most significant English language play of the 20th century in a British Royal National Theatre poll of 800 playwrights, actors, directors and journalists… Beckett's naked play about two tramps waiting for Godot has tapped into our 20th-century public consciousness. It seems to express our deepest fears and our deepest knowledge of ourselves and our predicament” (Norman Berlin). “The first production of Beckett's own English translation, directed by Peter Hall, was staged at the Arts Theatre Club in London in August 1955. Kenneth Tynan's and Harold Hobson's reviews made it into an intellectual hit which has since been regarded as having transformed the British stage” (Dictionary of National Biography). Preceded by the first edition (1952, in French) and the first American edition (1954).Octavo, original mustard cloth, original dust jacket. Book near-fine with slight lean; dust jacket with light edgewear, toning to top of rear panel.

FIRST EDITION, SECOND ISSUE.  “One batch of material proved too bulky for incorporation in the Descent of Man and Darwin held it over for separate treatment. This derived from his research into human and animal expressions...Though much of his analysis has been superseded, and was for modern scientific purposes marred by much unconscious anthropomorphism, he was convinced that an evolutionary continuity existed between the expressions (and hence mental life) of animals and humans, and that animals experience traces of every human emotion, including the moral feelings. In this sense,The Expression of the Emo- tions in Man and Animals completed his great cycle of evolutionary writings.” –Oxford Dictionary of National BiographyOctavo. Original green cloth. First edition, second issue with ʻhtatʼ for ʻthatʼ at top of page 208. Publisherʼs ads dated Nov. 1872. Spine ends rubbed, corners bumped; split at inner hinge. Clean throughout. An attractive copy.The Expression of Emotions describes how humans and animals express and signal their emotions to others. Darwin based his conclusions on worldwide questionnaires, photographs of actors, babies, and “imbeciles” in an asylum, as well as his own observations based on the grief expressed following a family death.

INSCRIBED BY BRETON TO MONIQUE FONG WUST. The 1950 limited edition. Quarto, original wrappers; glassine. Front wrapper detached, pages toned as usual; generally clean throughout. 

RACKHAM, ARTHUR; SWINBURNE, ALGERNON CHARLES.The Springtide of Life. Poems of Childhood by Algernon Charles Swinburne.SIGNED LIMITED FIRST EDITION, number 354 of only 765 copies signed by illustrator Arthur Rackham. Beautifully illustrated collection of Swinburne's children's poems, with nine mounted colored plates and 52 black and white drawings. One reason why Swinburne never brought out such a collection was his failure to find an artist who could interpret to his satisfaction the simplicity and freshness of his verses. We are fortunate in having secured, in Mr. Arthur Rackham, one whose delicate and romantic fancy is in sensitive harmony with Swinburne's, and who understands, no less than he did, ho 'Heaven lies about us in our infancy.'" –Edmund Gosse, Preface Quarto, original half vellum over parchment boards with gilt designs. Some soiling to endpapers, binding with only the slightest soiling; an exceptionally clean copy. 

FIRST EDITION of the tenth book in the James Bond series.Octavo. Original cloth, original dust jacket. Book near-fine, leaning very slightly; with elegant bookplate on front pastedown. Dust jacket unusually bright with very light toning; very trivial traces of wear. A lovely copy. 

Feynman's path integral formulation of quantum mechanics.  Also contains "A Generalized Theory of Gravitation" by Albert Einstein (pp. 35-39).Volume beautifully bound in cloth and boards in pristine condition inside and out.

First French edition, SIGNED BY BECKETT on title page; one of only 112 copies printed on "bouffant select marques" and reserved for the publishers. A collection of six short plays, translated from English by Beckett.  Octavo, original printed wrappers; glassine. Unopened. A FINE COPY.

FIRST EDITION. “[Buonarroti’s] combination of genuine (or perhaps contrived) religious devotion and true sensitivity to beauty that led him to make his remarkably original appraisal of early Christian art. Stimulated perhaps by what he himself had written nearly years before about the greater veneration likely to have been felt for the crudely carved gods of ancient Egypt than for the much more refined representations which could certainly have been made by later artists, he now carried this line of thought much further... by claiming that the lack of grace and design led to a certain reverential fear and majesty which were well suited to religious art... Buonarroti’s claims for the edifying value of clumsy artefacts produced by unskilled amateurs (claims backed up – to his own satisfaction and to that of his contemporaries – by specific examples carefully reproduced) do open a new chapter in the historian’s understanding of art. From now on it became increasingly accepted that weakness itself could be the best guarantee of purity and devotion.” –Francis Haskell, History and its Images: Art and the Interpretation of the past. Folio. Contemporary vellum; 35 engraved plates, (3 folding, xxxi numbered and 1 unnumbered), woodcut text illustrations. Skillful repair at head of spine extending into front board; moderate wear to binding extremities. Occasional spotting, generally clean throughout. A very attractive copy.

1804 edition of Hamilton's celebrated Outlines from the Figures and Compositions upon the Greek, Roman and Etruscan Vases, illustrated with 62 engraved plates.  Quarto. Half-title, 62 engraved plates by Kirk (uncoloured). Handsomely bound in quarter calf over vellum boards. Text and plates clean, small split at half-title (holding). Nice copy. 

First expanded edition. The one volume edition of 1817-19 was written by John P. Gandy and illustrated by Gell. Excavations continued throughout the 1820s. The 1832 edition was written by Gell himself and covers the recent excavations. “Pompeiana, published in 1817-19 brought the first comprehensive account of the excavations to English-speaking readers... Numerous editions issued over the next six decades influenced popular culture through a skillful illumination of fact with lively pictorial images. The first edition is a topographical tour covering major public and domestic structures... while the revised sequel of 1832.. presents the results of recent exploration, in the course of which a number of spectacular residences and baths were uncovered. Bringing to light noteworthy examples of mythological paintings, excavations carried out during the 1820s opened a window into the living quarters of Romans whose libraries and walls were replete with the texts and images of classical mythology.” –Claire L. Lyons and Marica Reed, Antiquity Recovered: The Legacy of Pompeii and Herculaneum Imperial octavo. Two volumes. (17x26.5cm) Contemporary silken green cloth with gilt labels to spine. Complete with 87 full page plates. With an additional 30 vignettes tipped on india. Untrimmed. Minor foxing to preliminaries; an excellent set in an attractive early binding.

FIRST EDITION. "Seventeenth-century readers approached Thomas Browne as an encyclopedic polymath with wide-ranging opinions of general interest in science and religion." –Claire Preston Reid Barbour, Sir Thomas Browne: The World Proposed Folio. Bound in full early calf, skillfully rebacked. Small repair at top margin of title, generally a sound, attractive copy.

FIRST EDITION, FIRST PRINTING of Miller's fourth novel in the original wrappers. With the scarce errata slip tipped-in; 60 Francs on the spine and front flap.  Moderate expert restoration at spine head and joints. Overall a very handsome copy. 

FIRST HARDCOVER EDITION, SIGNED BY LARRY CLARK, fully illustrated with reproductions of Clark's raw photographs. "I was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1943. When I was sixteen I started shooting amphetamine. I shot with my friends everyday for three years and then left town but I've gone back through the years. Once the needle goes in it never comes out."“The initial shock of Tulsa was that it was photographed from inside the story, and this changed everything.” –Andrew Roth, The Book of 101 PhotobooksClark's groundbreaking first book was originally issued as a paperback in 1971. Quarto, original cloth, original dust jacket. Fine condition.

FIRST EDITION of the famous Many Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. “Many worlds” is an alternative to the Copenhagen interpretation that creates a special role of the observer by postulating the collapse of the universal wave function at every observation.  Instead, Many Worlds proposes that the wave function never collapses, and views reality as a many-branched tree in which every possible outcome is realized through a splitting of reality into alternate universes – hence “many worlds.”In: Reviews of Modern Physics, vol. 29, no. 3, July, 1957, pp. 454-62, the entire issue in original orange printed wrappers offered here. Spine toned, owner signature on front wrapper, the word 'Gravitation' written in block letters at top of spine. A fresh, attractive copy.

LIMITED EDITION, 1/100 COPIES SIGNED AND NUMBERED BY LEVINTHAL, ISSUED WITH A PHOTOGRAPH. Essay by Manthia Diawara."Levinthal's work is important because it confronts us with the Blackface stereotype, makes it speak to us directly, without an intermediary, and demands a response from us regardless of our race, age, or gender."–Manthia DiawaraQuarto, stamped black cloth; in a stamped red cloth box. Cibachrome print, 10x8 inches, with Levinthal's signature on verso; framed. 1999.

FIRST EDITION. Contains a series of Wallaceʼs essays on the topic of natural selection, some original and some reprinted (including the two papers he published prior to Origin of Species). This is Wallaceʼs first writing on the topic of natural selection with respect to man. His thesis was that natural selection alone cannot explain the evolution of man.Octavo, recent half-calf over marbled boards. Library stamps on recto and verso of title. A handsome copy. 

THE ESTIENNE EDITION of the letters of Pliny the Younger (A.D. 61-113). Pliny is one of the three earliest non-Christian writers to mention Christ and the Christians. Quarto (240 x 170mm). Woodcut Estienne printer's device on title-page. Woodcut ornamental initials and headpieces. 19th-century tan calf, decorated in blind; joints split near top but holding. Hinges reinforced; occasional unobtrusive early underlining, scholarly notations and marginalia. This edition was printed by Paul Estienne (Paulus Stephanus), a member of the eminent Estienne (Stephanus) dynasty of French scholar-printers, and the son and successor of the great Henri Estienne.

FIRST EDITION IN FRENCH of this most important work in art history and criticism.“Winckelmann’s History had a remarkable impact for a scholarly antiquarian publication. It presented a comprehensive synthesis of available knowledge about the visual artefacts of the ancient world... Four main sculptural traditions were discussed in detail – the ancient Egyptian, Etruscan, Greek and Roman. What particularly caught the imagination of Winckelmann’s contemporaries, however, and still assures the book a place among the classics of art history, is what Winckelmann himself envisaged as its core, the eloquent and hugely ambitious attempt to redefine the history and aesthetics of the ancient Greek tradition.” –Alex Potts, Flesh and the Ideal: Winckelmann and the Origins of the History“[Winckelmann’s] magnum opus is in a class apart, for it completely revolutionized the study of art by treating it organically (Winckelmann was the first to do so) as part of the growth of the human race” –E.M. ButlerOctavo.Two volumes bound as one. Recent crushed morocco, rebacked with the original spine laid down, marbled endpaper.  Illustrated throughout. A handsome copy.

SECOND EDITION. "The best and last of the general rare book bibliographies... Brunet's annotations about the scholarly and commercial value of the books he listed are often still unsurpassed. There is hardly any other bibliography in which the wide range of its author's knowledge is more favorably displayed."–Grolier Club Octavo. Contemporary full-calf bindings in very good condition, spines with five raised bands and elaborate blind stamping, all edges marbled.

FIRST EDITION. Two volumes. [A third volume was published in 1815]. Quarto. Silhouette portrait frontispiece; errata leaf in volume II. An attractive, sound copy in contemporary half calf over marbled boards, original flat spines lettered in gold and with blind stamping and gold embellishments. Some minor rubbing to spine, abrasion to front board of vol. II; text clean.

FIRST EDITION of the ninth book in the James Bond series, in colorful "skeleton" dust jacket designed by Richard Chopping. Octavo, original black cloth with blind-stamped skeletal hand, original dust jacket. Book fine, small bookseller sticker at lower front paste down, dust jacket light toning at spine, small closed tear at spine head, small residue on back cover. A very good copy. 

"A seminal statement in the history and theory of architecture... one of the defining texts of postmodernism" – Aaron Vinegar, I Am a Monument: On Learning from Las Vegas FIRST EDITION of this landmark work. "We should not emphasize the ironic richness of banality in today's artistic context at the expense of discussing its appropriateness and inevitability on a wider basis."Folio. Original gilt-lettered blue cloth, original glassine dust jacket. Book fine; original glassine jacket with chips at spine ends and base of upper wrapper. A very good copy. 

FIRST EDITION. "The first statement of the theory of natural selection and an almost complete anticipation of Darwin's theory" – Garrison Morton"[What was done for animals artificially] seems to be done with equal efficiency, though more slowly, by nature, in the formation of varieties of mankind, fitted for the country which they inhabit. Of the accidental varieties of man, which would occur among the first scattered inhabitants, some one would be better fitted than the others to bear the dis- eases of the country. This race would multiply while the others would decrease, and as the darkest would be the best fitted for the [African] climate, at length [they would] be- come the most prevalent, if not the only race."Wells presented “An Account of a Female of the White Race...” to the Royal Society in 1813 but the work was not published until 1818, after his death, as a paper in the volume entitled Two Essays. In this paper, Wells describeshow the natural selection process applies to skin color in humans.Octavo.

FIRST EDITION of Jarrell's first book, SIGNED and INSCRIBED BY JARRELL.Octavo. Original red cloth, original dust jacket. Cloth clean, dust jacket very good with minor wear at spine heel and slight toning at spine. Signed and inscribed by Jarrell on the front free endpaper. Custom cloth clamshell box.

SECOND EDITION.“On the death of Doctor Johnson, a number of people, ambitious of being distinguished from the mute part of their species, set about relating and printing Stories and Bons Mots of this celebrated moralist.  Amongst the most zealous, though not the most enlightened, appeared Mr. Boswell and Madame Piozzi, the Hero and Heroine of our Eclogues...” London: Printed for G. Kearsley, 1786. Oblong quarto. Etched frontispiece. Engraved portrait of Pindar affixed to verso of title. 19th-century quarter morocco, spine lettered in gilt. A clean, attractive copy.

First edition of Hemingway's finest novel. Original cloth, original dust jacket. An excellent copy.

SIGNED AND INSCRIBED FIRST EDITION. Illustrated with photogravure reproductions of Weegee's photographs of New York City.Quarto. Original cloth, original photo-pictorial dust jacket. Significant chips and creases to fragile dust jacket. Rare signed. 

FIRST EDITION.“Buonarroti, the great-nephew of Michaelangelo the Younger who was himself the great-nephew of the artist, was born in 1661 and at the age of twenty left his native Florence to go to Rome, where he spent the next eighteen years or so devoting himself largely to antiquarian studies. He filled notebook after notebook with sketches, some rapid and some very careful, of coins, medals and other small objects, and he quickly earned the reputation of being one of the greatest antiquarians of his day... Through his membership of Queen Christina’s circle and later of the Arcadian Academy, he met many of the leading figures of the intellectual community and became closely involved in some of the most important scholarly enterprises of the time... In 1698 Buonarroti published his first book, which was devoted to medals belong to Cardinal Capegna, his principal patron... As might be expected from an author coming from such a cultivated background... he shows a greater feeling for quality than was usual among numismatists.” —Francis Haskell, History and its images: Art and the Interpretation of the past. Quarto. Early vellum. Engraved title vignette and additional title, 33 engraved plates, 3 folding, numerous engravings in text, wood-engraved initials. Wear with loss at spine head; generally clean throughout. A very attractive volume.

First edition. Original cloth, original dust jacket. An excellent copy. 

Folio. Full blind-paneled reversed calf, 6 raised bands on spine, hinges weak, engraved frontispiece, 81 fine engraved plates, subscriber's list, double-column text, clean and tight.

"The grandfather of pictorial histories, this mammoth work is a necessary part of any Civil War library. The work contains 3,389 images that constitute an important source on the war's appearance—its battlefields, common soldiers, officers, forts, diseases, camp scenes, army movements, and materiel." Eicher, The Civil War in Books 771."The greatest single collection of Brady illustrations" (Allan Nevins). The Mathew Brady photographs represent the first instance of a comprehensive photo-documentation of a war. New York: The Review of Reviews, 1911. Quarto, original blue cloth gilt. Ten volumes. An exceptional set, gilt uncommonly bright. Only occasional trivial wear to bindings. Very rare in this condition.

FIRST EDITION.  Octavo, original cloth, original dust jacket. A fine copy in an excellent dust jacket. Very minor wear at spine ends. Errata slip present. An excellent copy. 

FIRST EDITION, hardcover issue, SIGNED BY MAMET on dedication page. Winner of the 1976 Obie Award and the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best American Play of 1977; made into a 1996 film starring Dustin Hoffman. Octavo, original yellow cloth, original dust jacket; custom half-morocco box. A FINE COPY.

"American Prospects brought a new respect for color photography and a deeper understanding of American complexity." –Roth, 101 BooksFIRST EDITION of Sternfeld’s first and most celebrated photobook, illustrated with fifty-five color photographs. “Joel Sternfeld travelled the country for around eight years with a 8x10 view camera and colour film, a sojourn that produced his first and best-known book, American Prospects... The particular quality brought by Sternfeld to the 8x10 colour-landscape aesthetic... is a clear sense of narrative... In American Prospects, each picture suggests an arcane drama being played out—an elephant stranded on a road in Oregon, or a pumpkin stall in Virginia behind which a house burns fiercely. These narrative hints are suggestive, sly, often ironic, frequently mysterious, making American Prospects less a series of photographs than a series of tales—unfinished, elliptical certainly—that add up to a cogent and persuasive view of America...” (Parr/Badger, The Photobook). Roth 260.New York: Times Books, in association with the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas, 1987. Oblong quarto (255x302mm), original gray cloth, original photographic dust jacket. A hint of bowing to boards, otherwise book and dust jacket fine.

FIRST EDITION of one of Wallace's most important works. Wallace's treatment of the general distribution of island plant and animal life and the influence of the glacial epochs of these distribution patterns. Included is the first theory of continental glaciation, a discussion of island classification, and a survey of worldwide island faunas and floras.Octavo. Original green cloth. 3 maps (1 chromolithograph, 2 tinted); numer wood-engraved text illustrations throughout. A clean copy throughout; very minor rubbing at extremities. A very desirable copy.

FIRST EDITION of Arthur Miller's masterpiece. A very good copy in the original cloth and the original dust jacket. Jacket with light wear at spine, extremities. Overall a very attractive copy of this landmark work. 

"Bayle's Dictionary is a very useful work for those to consult who love the biographical part of literature, which is what I love most" – Samuel Johnson "He sets forth things with such an odious accuraqcy, and puts the arguments for both sides before us with such shocking impartiality and is so intolerably intelligible that he puts even thoise of the most meagre understanding in a position to judge and even to doubt what is told them." –Voltaire The second Edition. 10 volumes. Folio. Later 1/4 morocco over cloth. Bookplates. Library blind stamps to titles.

FIRST EDITION of Ishiguro's highly acclaimed first novel. Winner of the 1982 Winifred Holtby Memorial Prize. LONDON: FABER & FABER, 1982. Octavo, original cloth, original dust jacket; custom half-morocco box. Book fine, a touch of fading to dust jacket spine, otherwise fine. A beautiful copy. 

FIRST EDITION IN ENGLISH. Small octavo (12.5x18cm) Recent antique-style full marbled calf, blind tooled boards, 5 raised bands and 2 blind rules to spine, red Morocco label, modern endpapers. Significant repair to upper blank margin of title page, text generally clean with occasional spotting.

FIRST EDITION in English, beautifully illustrated with 104 plates (64 in full color), and TWO ORIGINAL COLOR LITHOGRAPHS done expressly for this edition.  "All the time I was working, I felt my father and my mother were looking over my shoulder, and behind them were Jews, millions of other vanished Jews of yesterday and a thousand years ago." –Chagall, on the creation of The Jerusalem Windows Chagall's Jerusalem Windows illustrates and chronicles the creation of the famous twelve stained glass windows, one for each of the twelve tribes of Israel, designed by Chagall for the Hadassah-Hebrew University Medical Center Synagogue in Jerusalem. Text and Notes by Jean Leymarie. Original red cloth, original pictorial dust jacket. Without the rarely seen publisher's slipcase. Book fine, dust jacket near-fine with only a little edgewear.