Current Events & Trends | September 7, 2021 | Jeremy Dibbell

Rare Books &c. at Auction This Week

Courtesy of Dominic Winter Auctioneers

Detail from an illustrated educational manuscript by Robert Dodsley (father of the publisher), offered at Dominic Winter Auctioneers this week.

Here are the auctions I'll be watching this week:

At Chiswick Auctions on Tuesday, September 7, 286 lots of 19th & 20th Century Photographs. Lots that caught my eye include a London police mugshot album covering the period 1895 to 1916 (£2,000–3,000); Marcus Lyon's Exodus IV (£2,500–3,500); and James Mcdonald's 1869 Ordnance Survey of the Peninsula of Sinai (£2,000–3,000).

Literature, Graphics, Ephemera are on the block at New England Auctions on Tuesday, in 192 lots. A set of the Nonesuch Dickens with one of the original woodblocks had been bid up to $4,000 by Monday morning. Other lots include Clement Clark Moore's Poems (1844), containing "A Visit from St. Nicholas"; a group of ten Sarah Orne Jewett volumes; and a first printing of the third edition of Leaves of Grass.

At Sotheby's London on Tuesday, Original Film Posters, in 243 lots. The poster for Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (1937) is expected to lead the sale at £12,000–18,000, while one for Gone With the Wind (1939) could fetch £8,000–12,000. A printer's proof for a Star Wars poster (1977) is estimated at £5,000–8,000.

Courtesy of Dominic Winter Auctioneers

On Wednesday and Thursday 8–9 September, 629 lots of Printed Books, Maps & Autographs, 20th Century Photography at Dominic Winter Auctioneers. Sharing the top estimate of £20,000–30,000 are a first edition of Newton's Opticks (1704), a collection of some 1,100 royal photographs from the collection of photographer Ray Bellisario, and a 1511 Bernard Sylvanus world map. An intriguing illustrated manuscript by Robert Dodsley (father of the publisher) is estimated at £3,000–5,000.

At Forum Auctions on Thursday, 289 lots of Modern Illustrated Books and Private Press. A 1968 edition of Flint's Breakfast in Périgord in an Elizabeth Greenhill binding is expected to lead the sale at £2,000–3,000. Four proof wood-engravings by Clare Leighton for the Macmillan edition of Hardy's The Return of the Native could sell for £750–1,000. One of 200 copies of the Chiswick Shakespeare on Japanese vellum is estimated at £600–800.

Two sales at Addison & Sarova round out the week: Rare Books, Manuscripts & Ephemera on Saturday, September 11 (313 lots) and the Bookworm Sale on Sunday, September 12 (230 lots). Saturday highlights are expected to include a set of Dickens' Christmas Books ($10,000–15,000) and Maury Bromsen's collection of material relating to the Chilean Revolution of 1891 ($5,000–15,000).