u/Hammer_Price

From the auction catalog notes:

Stoker, Bram (1847-1912). Dracula. Westminster: Archibald Constable & Company, 1897. 8vo. (Minor spotting to preliminary leaves.) Original yellow cloth lettered in red (rubbing to extremities, darkening to spine with some leaning, spotting to text block edges, hinges touched up).

Provenance: Helena Scott (ownership inscription dated July 1897); A.C. Dunn (ownership inscription); Davies & Son (booksellers' ticket).

"The world's most influential and enduring supernatural novel of vampirism, starring the most celebrated and evocative character in macabre literature" (Dalby).

FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE without the publisher's advertisements at the end as seen in the earliest presentation and review copies issued in May and June 1897, with the last page of text numbered 390 followed by an integral blank leaf. Prior to beginning work on Dracula, Bram Stoker compiled over a hundred pages of notes relating to vampiric folklore, the earliest of which is dated 8 May 1890 and comprises a short outline of what would become the novel's first chapter.

The story took a further two years to flesh out before Stoker began serious work on it during his summer holidays in Cruden Bay, Scotland, from 1893 to 1896.

Though well-reviewed, Dracula was not an immediate success and earned its author next to nothing in royalties, despite never having gone out of print. It has since become a cornerstone of the modern horror fiction genre and is considered the template for most future depictions of the vampire in popular fiction.

It's binding, widely regarded as the most celebrated and instantly recognizable book bindings of the Victorian era, exemplifies "the use of a significant cover in the form of a lurid yellow cloth binding with lettering in red.

To modern readers, this livery, created by an anonymous designer, is merely bold and eye-catching. For the original audience, however, it was freighted with symbolism and association. The livid red anticipates the emphasis on blood and bloodiness, but more important is the use of the colour yellow...it projected the notion of depravity by linking the text to The Yellow Book, the celebrated periodical published by John Lane in the 1890s as the organ of the Decadents. In its association... yellow...'became the colour of the hour' and was 'associated with all that was bizarre and queer in art and life, with all that was outrageously modern'" (Cooke, Simon. "Visualising Dracula." In: The Book Collector, Summer 2021, pp.234-237). Barron, Horror 3-186; Bleiler, Supernatural 1546; Dalby, 10(a); Wolff 6581. 

Computer translated and excerpted from the catalog notes

An architectural inlaid binding of the greatest importance and rarity on a superb calligraphic manuscript produced by one of the greatest scribes of the Renaissance, Bartolomeo Sanvito, dated and signed with his initials in the colophon.

Sanvito's elegant italic script inspired the italic typeface designed in 1500 by Francesco Griffo for the octavo series of Latin and Italian texts published by Aldus Manutius Marcus Tullius Cicero. De oratore. Rome, Friday, 20 December 1499. In folio (240 x 148 mm); 170 leaves.

Illuminated calligraphic manuscript on parchment, produced by Bartolomeo Sanvito, signed with his initials and dated on the colophon, 25 lines on recto and verso, humanistic cursive book script, black ink, running titles and rubrics in red, some corrections and marginal notes in red and black by the same hand, initials in gold and color forming the long headings at the beginning of each of the three books, 4 miniatures ...

The manuscript is preserved in a precious Roman inlaid binding of exceptional importance, whose extraordinary quality is such that it is reproduced in color as the frontispiece of volume III of Tammaro de Marinis's work "Artistic Binding in Italy in the 15th and 16th Centuries." De Oratore is Cicero's most important text on rhetoric and was considered essential by Italian humanists for the Latin style. The extraordinary elegance of its cursive script, among the most celebrated of the Renaissance, had a decisive influence on the development of the typeface engraved by Francesco Griffo for the editions of Aldus Manutius, contributing to the development of the Latin style.

From the auction catalog notes:

Speed (John). Theatrum Imperii Magnae Britanniae; Exactum Regnorum Angliae, Scotiae, Hiberniae et Insularum adiacentium geographiā ob oculos ponens... [The Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine], Opus ...nunc vero a Philemone Hollando, apud Coventrianos Medicinae Doctore Latinitate donatum, John Sudbury & George Humble, 1616, ornate engraved pictorial title and 'Achievement', both with contemporary hand-colouring, the latter heightened with gold, Achievement page dated 1614.

The Latin title apparently window mounted, and with 'Imprinted at London' at foot overlaid with 'Amstelodami', B1 strengthened on the recto on two margins (backed with later paper), five leaves of preliminary text, including Speed's address to the reader, laudatory verse and lists of contents, 67 uncoloured engraved double-page maps (complete) , woodcut head- and tail-pieces, woodcut initials, Kingdome of England map with very slight water stain to extreme outer margins, Devon with some creasing, Rutland with two small rust holes, all with Latin text on the verso, additional half titles for Wales, Scotland and Ireland all present, printed index at rear.

Upper inner hinge partially split, contemporary full vellum with yapp edges, gilt design to sidings, spine with near contemporary manuscript title in French 'Provinces d'Angleterre', linen ties replaced, some discolouration and minor staining to boards and spine, folio (sheet size 417 x 290 mm), contained in modern cloth solander box with gilt title to spine, rubbed and minor fraying to extremities QTY: (1)

NOTE:Chubb XXIVa 'extremely rare'; STC 23044.Attractive copy. The Latin edition of John Speed's Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine, the text of which is largely taken from William Camden's Britannia, first published in 1611-12. Translated by Philemon Holland (1552-1637), with the maps engraved chiefly by Jodocus Hondius. First published in English in 1606, Speed's atlas followed the model of Ortelius's Theatrum Orbis Terrarum in its title and format, with the map sheets backed by historical and geographical texts and gazetteers of place names, and was the one of the earliest attempts in England at producing an large scale atlas, including the first detailed maps of Ireland, the first set of county maps consistently showing the boundaries of territorial divisions, and the first truly comprehensive set of English town plans.

From auction catalog notes:

Shakespeare, William (1564-1616). As You Like It. -- The Taming of the Shrew. [Two complete plays extracted from: The First Folio]. [London: Isaac laggard and Ed. Blount, 1623]. Folio (305 x 197 mm). Comprising 46 pages (185-230) on 23 leaves (Q3-V1); opening to All's Well that Ends Well on V1r. Woodcut head- and tail-pieces, opening initials. (Corner tear to R1 partially affecting letters, a few marginal tears repaired, marginal tears to T3-T4 affecting some letters and border, light scattered stains or soiling.) Modern quarter calf, marbled boards.

FIRST PRINTINGS OF TWO COMPLETE PLAYS FROM SHAKESPEARE'S FIRST FOLIO, BOTH PRINTED HERE FOR THE FIRST TIME.

The Taming of the Shrew, one of Shakespeare's most popular comedies, centers on the courtship and marriage of the sharp-tongued Katherina and the determined Petruchio. Set in Padua, the play unfolds alongside a secondary plot involving Katherina’s younger sister Bianca, whose numerous suitors must wait until the elder sister is married. Petruchio agrees to the match and sets about “taming” Katherina through a series of calculated reversals—exaggerated behavior, feigned eccentricity, and deliberate contradictions—until she ultimately conforms to the expectations of marriage.

As You Like It remains one of the most beloved and most performed plays, and includes the famous speech by the melancholy Jacques, "All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players; They have their exits and their entrances, and one man in his time plays many parts...." The play follows the banished heroine Rosalind, who disguises herself as the young man “Ganymede” while fleeing to the Forest of Arden with her cousin Celia. There she encounters Orlando, the object of her affection, along with a variety of exiles, shepherds, and courtly figures whose intertwined romances unfold in the freedom of the countryside.

From auction catalog notes:

Philip K. Dick. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Garden City: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1968. 8vo. Publisher's gray cloth, spine lettered in gilt; original pictorial dust jacket. FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE, with code "J5" on page 210. REVIEW COPY, with printed publisher's slip laid in.

Philip K. Dick's most famous novel and a foundational work of modern science fiction. The book served as the basis for classic cult film, Blade Runner (1982), directed by Ridley Scott and starring Rutger Hauer and Harrison Ford.

Condition: Cloth very fine and bright. Dust jacket unclipped (priced "3.95"), with slightest rubbing to extremities; verso with very light toning at folds, otherwise fine. A VERY FINE AND BRIGHT COPY.

References: Currey, p. 156; Levack 12a.

Provenance: From the collection of David Aronovitz.

From the auction catalog notes:

Ray Bradbury. Fahrenheit 451. New York: Ballantine Books, Inc., [1953]. 8vo. Publisher's red boards, spine and front board lettered in yellow (Currey's binding D); original pictorial dust jacket. FIRST EDITION. PRESENTATION COPY, INSCRIBED BY THE AUTHOR TO DAVID ARONOVITZ WITH A DRAWING DEPICTING FIRE FLAMES on the front free endpaper: "David – this unburnable book – signed by Montag's father / Ray Bradbury / Feb. 6, 1989."

Winner of the 1954 Retrospective Hugo Award for Best Novel, presented in 2004.

Condition: Slightest touch of edgewear, and to spine ends and corners. Dust jacket unclipped (priced "$2.50"); small stain to front panel; light scuffing at folds; very mild edgewear; an uncommonly fine example of this dust jacket, usually prone to fading.

References: Aronovitz, Ballantine Books, pp. 24-25; Currey, pp. 55-56.

Provenance: David Aronovitz (presentation inscription). From the collection of David Aronovitz.

J. R. R. Tolkien. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy: comprising The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1954-1955. 3 volumes, 8vo. In-text illustration by Tolkien in Fellowship ("The Doors of Durin"); folding map by the author's son, Christopher Tolkien, tipped-in at rear of each volume.

Publisher's red cloth, spines stamped in gilt, top edges red; original pictorial dust jackets. FIRST EDITIONS, FIRST IMPRESSIONS.

The Fellowship of the Ring, first edition, first impression, with signature mark "4" on p. 49, first state dust jacket;

The Two Towers, first edition, first impression, with signature mark "4" on page 49, first state dust jacket;

The Return of the King, first edition, first impression, p. 49 variant 3 with sagging text and signature mark "4" present, p. 281 variant 2 with the gap in "Men" closed, first state dust jacket.

EACH IN AN UNRESTORED FIRST STATE DUST JACKET. Overall, an attractive set.

References: Hammond & Anderson A5a.i, ii, and iii.

Provenance: From the collection of David Aronovitz.

From auction catalog notes:

Endore, Guy (1901-1970). The Werewolf of Paris. New York: Farrar & Rinehart, 1933. 8vo. Original mustard yellow cloth lettered in red, top edge stained red; dust jacket (spot of wear near top of spine). FIRST EDITION, FIRST PRINTING with the Farrar & Rinehart seal present on the copyright page.

This work served as the basis for the 1961 horror film The Curse of the Werewolf, with a screenplay by Anthony Hinds and direction by Terence Fisher, starring Oliver Reed, Clifford Evans, and Yvonne Romain. Notably, the film adaptation remains the only werewolf picture produced by Hammer Film Productions, the studio otherwise famed for its long-running cycles of Dracula and Frankenstein films.

The dust jacket features a striking montage of macabre imagery set against a Parisian backdrop.

The Werewolf of Paris is a "classic novel that takes its inspiration from a reported case of necrophilia and cannibalism at the time of the Paris Commune...A sarcastic and bitterly misanthropic allegory, by far the most effective of all the novels in which the werewolf becomes a symbol of divided and conflict-ridden human nature" (Barron). EXCEEDINGLY RARE: According to online records, no copies of the true first edition have appeared at auction.

Barron, Anatomy of Horror 4-51; Bleiler, Supernatural 611. A VERY FINE COPY. This lot is located in Chicago.

Comments from the Heritage catalog:

Stephen King. The Dark Tower Series. Comprising first limited editions of The Dark Tower I-VII, The Little Sisters of Eluria, and The Wind Through the Keyhole. West Kingston: Donald M. Grant Publishers Inc., [1982 – 2012]. 8vo.

Nine titles in twelve volumes. Publisher's cloth; original pictorial dust jackets; all housed in publisher's slipcases as issued. FIRST AND LIMITED EDITIONS, each numbered 3. SIGNED BY THE AUTHOR AND RESPECTIVE ILLUSTRATOR. Each title (first volume in multi-volume titles) is signed by King and the respective illustrators: Michael Whelan, Phil Hale, Ned Dameron, Dave McKean, Bernie Wrightson, Darrel Anderson, and Jae Lee.

The Gunslinger. [West Kingston]: Donald M. Grant Publisher Inc., [1982].

The Drawing of the Three. [West Kingston]: Donald M. Grant Publisher Inc., [1987].

The Waste Lands. Hampton Falls: Donald M. Grant Publisher, Inc., [1991].

Wizard and Glass. Hampton Falls: Donald M. Grant Publisher Inc., [1997]. In two volumes. In original shrink-wrap, not examined outside of packaging.

Wolves of the Calla. Hampton Falls: Donald M. Grant Publisher Inc., 2003. In two volumes.

Song of Susannah. Hampton Falls: Donald M. Grant Publisher. Inc., 2004.

The Dark Tower. Hampton Falls: Donald M. Grant Publisher Inc., 2004. In two volumes.

The Little Sisters of Eluria. Hampton Falls: Donald M. Grant Publisher Inc., [2008].

The Wind Through the Keyhole. Hampton Falls: Donald M. Grant Publisher Inc., [2012].

"The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed." With this immortal opening line, Stephen King launched what would become his epic Dark Tower cycle. The series began in 1970, when King, then an undergraduate at the University of Maine, wrote the first chapters of a story many now regard as his most ambitious, influential, and deeply personal work.

Over the next quarter century, Roland of Gilead and his ka-tet made their long march toward the Dark Tower, mirroring King's own decades-long journey in shaping the series. Believing the story to be too artsy and esoteric for his mainstream audience, King entered into an agreement with Grant for exclusive hardcover rights to The Dark Tower—past, present, and future.

This arrangement remained in place until 2003, when an unprecedented multi-publisher agreement brought the final three volumes of the main series to the mass market.

Throughout, Grant has remained a steadfast champion of The Dark Tower, with the limited editions produced through this collaboration consistently ranking among the most sought-after by collectors. Condition: All volumes are in fine condition.

References: Chalker & Owings pp. 213-228. Provenance: From the collection of David Aronovitz.

Descriptive comments from the Heritage catalog notes

J. R. R. Tolkien. The Hobbit, or There and Back Again. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, [1937]. 8vo. Frontispiece and eight text illustrations by the author, inserted half-tone plate by the author, integral advertisement leaf at end. Publisher's green cloth decoratively stamped in blue, off-white endpapers printed with Thror's map and a map of Wilderland after drawings by the author, top edge stained green; original pictorial dust jacket after drawing by the author, with "Dodgeson" corrected by hand on rear flap.

FIRST EDITION, FIRST IMPRESSION. Only 1,500 copies of the first impression of this, one of the cornerstones of fantasy literature, were printed. It was Tolkien's third published book, preceded only by two academic texts. IN A BRIGHT AND UNRESTORED DUST JACKET hand corrected on the rear flap.

In a letter to poet W. H. Auden in 1955, Tolkien recalls the beginning of this now-essential fantasy tale. He wrote, "All I remember about the start of The Hobbit is sitting correcting School Certificate papers in the everlasting weariness of that annual task forced on impecunious academics with children. On a blank leaf I scrawled: ‘In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.' I did not and do not know why..."

Tolkien's fantasy epic, published nearly seventeen years before his Lord of the Rings trilogy, invites the reader, "if you care for journeys there and back, out of the comfortable Western world, over the edge of the Wild, and home again, and can take an interest in a humble hero (blessed with a little wisdom and a little courage and considerable good luck), here is the record of such a journey and such a traveller..."

Condition: Spine just leaned; pale toning to endleaves. Dust jacket unclipped (priced "7s. 6d. net"); spine toned; light edgewear, a few minor chips at spine panel head and folds. A beautiful example of this fragile dust jacket.

References: Currey, p. 476; Hammond & Anderson A3a; The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien, Selected and Edited by Humphrey Carpenter, with the Assistance of Christopher Tolkien, letter 163. Provenance: From the collection of David Aronovitz.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968). Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1958. Early printing. Signed in blue ballpoint on the front free endpaper, "Best Wishes / Martin L. King, Jr." The Montgomery Bus Boycott was Dr. King's first major civil rights campaign of the 1950s, begun when Rosa Parks bravely refused to give up her bus seat and was arrested as a result. Book measures 5.625" x 8.375" and runs 230pp. Book is bound in original blue and black publisher's boards with silver lettering. Both book and jacket are in unusually pristine, near fine condition with only light wear.

Computer translated from German catalog notes: Amsterdam, J. Blaeu, 1662, Imperial folio with hand colored woodcut title vignette and 23 double page, hand engraved maps.

Lincoln's assassin John Wilkes Booth Photograph Signed and Inscribed, "Yours Truly / J. Wilkes Booth," half-length portrait by Case & Getchell, showing him seated in ¾ view with fist resting on his hip and holding a cane [in Boston, 1862]. Inscribed in the image at upper edge (with side and upper extremes continuing onto the mount). 3¾x2 inches (image), 4x2½ inches overall; faint soiling to edges recto, slight horizontal crease at middle (without loss to emulsion), remnants of mounting at upper and lower edges verso, photographer's imprint on the mount at lower edge and on verso, rich image and bold signature; in double-sided frame.

Excerpts from catalog notes:

First edition, "The Book of Mormon: An Account Written by the Hand of Mormon, Upon Plates Taken from the Plates of Nephi…" by Joseph Smith (1805-1844). Palmyra: Printed by E. B. Gradin, for the Author, 1830. 588pp [1, “Testimony of Three Witnesses], [1, “And Also the Testimony of Eight Witnesses"]. 8vo, 4.75" x 7.5". While no ownership signature is present, passages underlined in period ink can be found intermittently throughout, with evidence of some notations having been erased or brightened. .... Certainly the restoration is an antiquated attempt and we feel a full restoration employing the tools and methods available today could make this much more attractive and at a relatively nominal cost. Most recently a comparable, library-owned printing sold at our February 2026 auction for a record-breaking $250,000 including buyer's premium.

The Book of Mormon is Joseph Smith's translation of the golden tablets revealed to him by the angel Moroni on the hill of Cumorah near Manchester, New York. Printed only two weeks prior to the formal establishment of the Mormon Church, this is the only edition where Joseph Smith is identified as the "author" rather than as the "translator," as it appears in subsequent editions.

This copy is complete with the "Testimony of the Three Witnesses” signed in type by Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, Martin Harris on who attest that they had “seen the plates that which contain this record. On the verso of the same leaf appears “And Also The Testimony of the Eight Witnesses” bearing the names of Christian Whitmer, Jacob Whitmer, Peter Whitmer, Jr., John Whitmer, Hiram Page, Joseph Smith, Sen., Hyrum Smith, and Samuel H. Smith, all of whom attest that Joseph Smith had “shewn unto us the plates….” Smith dictated the text to Oliver Cowdery, who also served as scribe. Egbert B. Grandin, a local printer and proprietor of the 'Wayne Sentinel', undertook to print the sizeable edition (5,000 copies) for the 25-year old Smith. Of these original 5,000 copies printed, it is estimated that as few as 500 have survived in the market. 

The manuscript "was delivered a few pages at a time to the typesetter, who supplied all the punctuation and paragraphing" (Crawley and Flake). The Church catalog notes that this first printing of the Mormon Bible forbade freemasonry and polygamy, but the latter doctrine was altered in subsequent editions.

Excerpt from catalog notes:

LIMITED EDITION, one of 425 copies of a total edition of 438. "THE FINEST BOOK SINCE GUTENBERG" (Franklin). The supreme achievement of the forty-year artistic collaboration between Morris and Burne-Jones, and of the Kelmscott Press: "the final chapter of co-operation; the venture in which their particular talents are combined for the last time, and to spectacular effect" (Robinson).

Earliest plans for the work date to 1891 and the book announced to Kelmscott Press subscribers in December, however the actual printing of the book did not begin until August 1894, and was only issued to subscribers in June 1896.

Considered one of the great books of the world.

CHAUCER, GEOFFREY. 1343-1400. The Works ... now newly imprinted. Edited by F.S. Ellis. Hammersmith: Kelmscott Press, 1896. Folio. Printed in Chaucer and Troy types, in red and black, woodcut title, borders and initials by C.E. Keates, W.H. Hooper and W. Spielmeyer after William Morris, 87 woodcut illustrations by W.H. Hooper after Edward Burne-Jones. Levant morocco by Birdsall, the upper cover tooled with original border design of leaves and flowers in various colored morocco with a centered reproduction of the pilgrims setting off for Canterbury and the title tooled in gilt, the lower cover with a similar border design gilt title and reproducing, in various colored leather, the woodcut of the story of Troilus and Cressida, spine in 6 compartments gilt lettered in 2 with matching design, blue morocco doublures with wide and intricate design of roses and leaves.