<i>In The News:</i> The Most Expensive American Letter Ever Auctioned, BookFinder, Via Libri & More
- by Michael Stillman
3. Out of the Silent Planet, a first edition by Narnia's own C.S. Lewis, one of his earliest and rarest works, published in 1938. $7,950.
2. Poems (1909-1925) by T.S. Eliot, one of 85 numbered copies signed by Eliot. $8,500.
1. The First Six Books of the Elements of Euclid, by, of course, Euclid, in a Chiswick Press edition of 1847 that has been described as "one of the oddest and most beautiful books of the century." It was designed to simplify Euclid's propositions. $11,750.
A sad story from Florida reminds us of a basic truth about the rare and antiquarian book field. A house fire destroyed much of the collection of old Southeast Asian books of Ken Davis of Holmes Beach. He had spent many years building the collection, which he hoped to someday give to an Asian library. What this points out is the basic reality: like real estate, they aren't making any more antiquarian books. The number in existence can only go down. That point has been obscured in recent years by the development of the internet, which has brought many forgotten copies of old books out of the woodwork. Nonetheless, old books can only become rarer. The number of copies of the books in Davis' Asian collection still in existence has just been reduced by one.
