Rare Book Monthly Articles - June - 2022 Issue

The Sale of The Private Collection of William S. Reese:  Success!!

The Sale of The Private Collection of William S. Reese: Success!!

Bringing a major sale successfully into the rooms is an accomplishment in every era and during the Covid years, unusually risky.  Christie’s pursued the Reese sales and it seemed likely they would handle it but still had to get the commitment, and then deliver.  On May 25-26 the consignors and Christies achieved all that was possible.  Many higher echelon collectors and dealer-collectors ultimately exit at auction and, no doubt, many will be studying the Reese model.  We’ll see it again.  It was perfect.   What made Bill’s sales so interesting was the tricky combination of superb material...

NFTs – A Cautionary Tale

NFTs – A Cautionary Tale

NFTs (non-fungible tokens) have become the rage in collecting over the past year. NFTs are essentially a digital version of something with an electronic “token” attached which makes it unique. The ...

John Reznikoff:  one of the old men at 62

John Reznikoff: one of the old men at 62

University Archives was a new and interesting idea when John Reznikoff enrolled at Fordham in 1978 for a Jesuit education that accentuated context, experience, reflection and evaluation.   Simply s...

Some Marketing & Tech Tips for Older Book Sellers

Some Marketing & Tech Tips for Older Book Sellers

I’ve written in this space before about dropping eBay as a selling platform after more than 20 years. Today I’m writing about rebuilding my book and ephemera business using a mixture of old and new...

Announcing the Inaugural Kenneth W. Rendell Endowed Lecture at Rare Book School

Announcing the Inaugural Kenneth W. Rendell Endowed Lecture at Rare Book School

Rare Book School is pleased to announce that Kenneth W. Rendell and Shirley McNerney have generously endowed an annual lecture on the importance of original manuscripts and rare books to human unde...

The New Wild West – New York City Repeals All Auction Regulations

The New Wild West – New York City Repeals All Auction Regulations

New York City has repealed its regulations that applied to book and art auctions. It apparently came as a surprise even to the auction houses. City officials justified the move as streamlining law ...

Collecting Memories

Collecting Memories

Recently I saw an item that looked interesting to me:  a handmade bookmark related to New Paltz.  For $125 I immediately committed and a little gem soon arrived in a small package protected by two ...

The True Colours of Tavernier’s travels!

The True Colours of Tavernier’s travels!

Exploring the relation of the Middle East explorer Jean Baptiste Tavernier through an unusual copy that was published in 1810 by Lepetit’s widow.   In the early part of the year 1631, Jean-Baptis...

A Bill Has Been Filed to Greatly Reduce the Length of Copyrights. Why Now?

A Bill Has Been Filed to Greatly Reduce the Length of Copyrights. Why Now?

After years of extending the length of copyrights, legislation has been introduced in the United States Congress to roll back the term of those protections. If enacted, it will be quite a turnabout...

Reimagining Winnie the Pooh - Like You Never Saw Him Before

Reimagining Winnie the Pooh - Like You Never Saw Him Before

The subject of copyrights is back in the news as a bill has been proposed to Congress to reduce the length of copyright protection. Missouri Senator Josh Hawley's legislation has little to do with ...

12 Million is just a number but it’s a big one

12 Million is just a number but it’s a big one

Recently Transactions+ reached twelve million full text records.   Or said another way, it’s now the equivalent of 1,142 copies of Howes’ Usiana’s 10,501 records, the first rare book reference I ...

Macon Brothers Rare Books, Maps & Ephemera Sale Features a Unique, Colored Copy of Chaperon's 1649 Raphael Frescoes

Macon Brothers Rare Books, Maps & Ephemera Sale Features a Unique, Colored Copy of Chaperon's 1649 Raphael Frescoes

Macon Brothers Auctioneers is holding a sale of Rare Books, Maps, Atlases Ephemera. The sale is online and will be running from now until 10:00 a.m. Pacific Time on June 11. The items come from th...

Bloomsday June 16

Bloomsday June 16

2022 marks the 100th birthday of the publication of Joyce's Ulysses in 1922 by Paris bookseller, Sylvia Beach, an American from Baltimore. Libraries, campuses, and bookstores are planning live read...

Morgan Library & Museum, NY, Launches  Major U.S. James Joyce Exhibition

Morgan Library & Museum, NY, Launches Major U.S. James Joyce Exhibition

The Morgan Library Museum, New York, presents a major U.S. exhibition on James Joyce, nicely timed for 'Bloomsday", June 16th -- One Hundred Years of James Joyce's Ulysses. June 3 through October ...

The Rose City Book & Paper Fair Returns June 17-18

The Rose City Book & Paper Fair Returns June 17-18

The annual Rose City Book Paper Fair will be returning to its normal time and place after a two-year absence. Its normal time is in June and its normal place is in the physical world, not the invi...

Nine New Booksellers' Catalogues Reviewed This Month

Nine New Booksellers' Catalogues Reviewed This Month

This month we review nine new booksellers' catalogues. Librairie Métamorphoses has a collection of rare books and valuable documents. Garrett Scott Bookseller has his first printed catalogue in 9 y...

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

Article Search

Archived Articles

Ask Questions