Rare Book Monthly Articles - April - 2013 Issue

Dorothy Sloan Auction No. 23:  an important sale

Dorothy Sloan Auction No. 23:  an important sale

The Dorothy Sloan Auction No. 23 of Americana approaches. The sale will be on April 4th and 5th, 2013. These sales, one or so a year, are prepared with a care most associated with the skeptic.  Auctions are resurrections, the always-uncertain process of reconfirmation.  Fates will be decided in the rooms but this does not mean that the lawyerly Ms. Sloan will leave any information about the lots in the docket unstated.  She always makes her case and it makes her a creditable advocate for sellers and a trusted source for buyers.  She takes this seriously, as interested for the buyer and alwa...

Booksellers Win Right to Resell Secondhand Books in U.S. Supreme Court Decision

Booksellers Win Right to Resell Secondhand Books in U.S. Supreme Court Decision

In a major case that pitted used book sellers, libraries, museums and other retailers against book publishers, the U.S. Supreme Court came down squarely on the booksellers' side. The Court ruled th...

The Book War at the French Auction House Drouot

The Book War at the French Auction House Drouot

Things change, so does the French auction house Drouot. The walls of the common parts have been repainted in white, and a gorgeous modern staircase now leads you to the basement rooms. On March the...

The Market versus the Book

The Market versus the Book

The weekly auction update is our effort to separate the long-term history of books [and manuscripts, maps and ephemera] from the ever-changing immediate market for them. There’s a tendency to think...

To Co-Op or Not to Co-Op

To Co-Op or Not to Co-Op

Our little “Open by Appointment” bookstore is perched at 6200 feet in the Northern Nevada Mountains in Virginia City. But, if it weren’t for my online sales, we could not continue to operate. It is...

April in New York

April in New York

53rd ABAA NY Fair On Thursday April 11th, as they have for more than 50 years, members of the Antiquarian Booksellers’ Association and the International League of Antiquarian Booksellers, will hol...

The “Finest Mormon Collection in Private Hands” Offered by Michael Vinson Americana

The “Finest Mormon Collection in Private Hands” Offered by Michael Vinson Americana

Michael Vinson Americana has acquired the core of what Peter Crawley, author of Descriptive Bibliography of the Mormon Church, called “the finest and most important Mormon collection in private han...

The 1913 Armory Show Revisited – The New Spirit

The 1913 Armory Show Revisited – The New Spirit

100th Anniversary of Landmark 20th Century Exhibit Many special events on-line sites join in celebration The Armory Show, even 100 years later the name alone conjures up superlatives: it was hug...

So many items, so little time

So many items, so little time

The Roy Davids sale of Poetical Manuscripts Portraits of Poets  [A-K] at Bonhams in London on April 10th will test the mettle and self-confidence of the most serious collectors of poetry for there...

Change as Opportunity

Change as Opportunity

Forty years ago Victor Grace and his wife Jackie lived in New Jersey where they built a career and a life around the search for and later sale of beautiful material.  Victor from the outset was and...

Freeman's Auctioneers, April 4th, 5th and 17th

Freeman's Auctioneers, April 4th, 5th and 17th

Freeman’s Auctioneers Appraisers in Philadelphia is holding three sales in April that warrant attention: Rare Books and Manuscripts on the 4th, Posters, Maps and Other Graphics on the 5th, and Ame...

Timothy Hughes Rare and Early Newspapers Launches Their New Website

Timothy Hughes Rare and Early Newspapers Launches Their New Website

Timothy Hughes Rare and Early Newspapers recently launched a new website. If you like old newspapers, and I will admit to this being a passion of mine, you will love the new site. They have managed...

Someone Very Rich Still Believes in Newspapers

Someone Very Rich Still Believes in Newspapers

Do you still believe in newspapers? Many have written them off, consigned them to virtual extinction over the next decade or so. However, one person who does still believe in newspapers is America'...

Dreweatts and Bloomsbury Auctions Acquired by the Noble Investment [UK] PLC Group

Dreweatts and Bloomsbury Auctions Acquired by the Noble Investment [UK] PLC Group

These are days when the future of bookselling is a bit clouded and the coin and fabric of the field seemingly subject to relentless retesting.  Even so there are glimmers of new realities that expl...

Barnes & Noble: Yesterday's Goliath Struggles to Survive

Barnes & Noble: Yesterday's Goliath Struggles to Survive

If the typical, private bookseller is finding these to be complicated times for retail, then perhaps they can sympathize with their dreaded competitor from the 1990s, Barnes Noble. Barnes Noble s...

Auctions in April

Auctions in April

This April, as of March 28th, 99 sales with more than 25,000 lots are scheduled.  Dates occasionally change, others are added and a few delayed but the events as shown here are substantially what t...

Attention Appraisers: ASA Hosts Conference on Trusts and Estates

The American Society of Appraisers will be hosting a conference on the role of appraisers in trusts and estates from May 1-3 in Arlington, Virginia (just outside of Washington, D.C.). The purpose i...

17 New Bookseller Catalogues Reviewed

17 New Bookseller Catalogues Reviewed

For April, we received 17 new catalogues to review. No fooling! The William Reese Company has reached a milestone – their 300th catalogue. It features exceptional Americana. The Raab Collection has...

Rare Book Monthly

  • Sotheby's
    Sell Your Fine Books & Manuscripts
    Sotheby’s: The Shem Tov Bible, 1312 | A Masterpiece from the Golden Age of Spain. Sold: 6,960,000 USD
    Sotheby’s: Ten Commandments Tablet, 300-800 CE | One of humanity's earliest and most enduring moral codes. Sold: 5,040,000 USD
    Sotheby’s: William Blake | Songs of Innocence and of Experience. Sold: 4,320,000 USD
    Sotheby’s: The Declaration of Independence | The Holt printing, the only copy in private hands. Sold: 3,360,000 USD
    Sotheby's
    Sell Your Fine Books & Manuscripts
    Sotheby’s: Thomas Taylor | The original cover art for Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. Sold: 1,920,000 USD
    Sotheby’s: Machiavelli | Il Principe, a previously unrecorded copy of the book where modern political thought began. Sold: 576,000 GBP
    Sotheby’s: Leonardo da Vinci | Trattato della pittura, ca. 1639, a very fine pre-publication manuscript. Sold: 381,000 GBP
    Sotheby’s: Henri Matisse | Jazz, Paris 1947, the complete portfolio. Sold: 312,000 EUR

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