In mid-December 2024, two members of the book club were talking about a recently ended auction in which both had bid on different lots, though only one was successful in acquiring his desired book, a first edition of Wieland. He said, "That will be my big buy of the year."
The other collector replied, "With the Wieland and the 'Second Tamerlane,' you had a good auction year in 2024!"
The first collector responded, "Oh, I've already forgotten about the Tamerlane. Thanks for reminding me!"
That brief exchange inspired the topic of Favorite Acquisitions of 2024. The January 2025 topic had already been chosen, so it was selected as the topic for the February meeting.
This blog begins with the two books which instigated the topic.
An Early American Collector
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| Wieland |
Brown, Charles Brockden. Wieland; or The Transformation. An American Tale. New York: Printed by T. & J. Swords for H. Caritat, 1798. First edition. A near fine copy of the first American gothic novel in the original contemporary mottled "tree" sheep with a red morocco title label on the spine and housed in a calf slipcase. Wieland was influential in the development of the gothic genre by Edgar Alan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and H.P. Lovecraft. Copies of Wieland in the original binding are rare; only three copies have appeared at auction in the last fifty years. This copy bears an impressive provenance having passed through several significant collections, including the private libraries of Julius Denning, Clifton Waller Barrett, and William A. Strutz.
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| Tamerlane |
Poe, Edgar Allan. Tamerlane and Other Poems. London: George Redway, 1884. This "Second Edition" is limited to 100 numbered copies, now rarely seen. This edition, the first to be printed in its original form since Poe's 1827 first edition, is a type facsimile created from a copy at the British Museum and is the earliest known reprint. At the time the facsimile was printed, the 1827 copy at the British Museum was believed to be the only surviving first edition, of which only about 50 copies were printed. This copy is bound in the original full vellum and is number 49 of 100 copies.
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| Billy Budd |
Melville, Herman. Billy Budd: Foretopman. London: John Lehmann, 1946. Introduction by William Plomer. A somewhat scarce copy in the original dust jacket. This is the first separately published edition of the novella after it was originally published in the 1924 limited Standard Edition.
A Graham Greene Collector
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| The Man Within |
Greene, Graham. The Man Within. London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1929. Fourth impression (September 1929) of the first British edition. Forget the book; it's just there to protect the dust jacket. This is all about the jacket! This pictorial dust jacket was intended for a Heinemann "Cheap Edition" (or "3/6 Library") to be published in the mid-1930s. Cheap editions were printed on lower-quality paper and sold at a lower price than the regular editions, once regular sales declined. Heinemann pulled the plug on this title's cheap edition, for reasons not known, and it was never produced, but the project was far enough along that a few jackets—proofs?—were printed. These jackets are rare. The collector says, "I have only seen two other copies of this jacket. The first came up for auction at Sotheby's in 1996, which is where I first discovered its existence. The second copy was tattered and in poor condition and not worth the asking price. This third copy popped up in 2024 at a small estate auction house in Wales in a small lot of miscellaneous books, and I was the sole bidder on the lot."
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| Travels With My Aunt |
Greene, Graham. Travels With My Aunt. London: The Bodley Head Ltd., 1969. First British edition with dust jacket. Together with five typed letters from Josphine Reid, Greene's secretary and typist, to the Viking Press and Laurence Pollinger, Greene's literary agent.
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| Sample corrected page and letter |
This copy includes 11 pages with handwritten corrections in the text block in an unknown hand, possibly Reid's (but definitely not Greene's). The corrections in the book correspond to the letters to Viking Press attempting to make these corrections in the American edition. Those letters are dated: 15 September, 27 October, 29 October, 3 December, and 8 December 1969. Reid also made one phone call on 15 December to convey one final correction. An undated unrevised proof from Viking Press does not include any of the corrections, but the first printing of the Viking American edition does include some of the corrections. The September and October corrections were offered in time, but the December corrections arrived too late; the Viking edition was released on 20 January 1970. This hand-corrected copy is significant to the publication history of Travels With My Aunt and accounts for the textual differences between the UK and US editions.
A Children's and Illustrated Books Collector
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| The Diary of a Young Girl |
Frank, Anne. The Diary of a Young Girl. Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, 1952. Introduction by Eleanor Roosevelt. Frank's diary was first published in Dutch as Het Achterhuis (The Annex) in 1947; the English translation by B. M. Mooyaart-Doubleday was published in 1952. This copy is a second printing of the first edition in English, printed the same year, matching all points of issue identifying the first printing dust jacket on a non-stated first edition book, thus making it the second printing.
A Science Fiction Collector
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| A Canticle for Leibowitz |
Miller, Walter M., Jr. A Canticle for Leibowitz. Philadelphia & New York: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1960. First edition published in 1960 (with a 1959 copyright).
The topic for the September 2023 meeting was Title or Edition You Want to Upgrade. The collector showed an ex-library copy of one of his favorite books, A Canticle for Liebowitz, with the usual stamps and damages. He noted at the time that the dust jacket for the book is fragile and rarely seen in fine condition, and how collectible copies can be quite expensive. In 2024, the collector located an immaculate copy in Near Fine condition with a pristine dust jacket, successfully upgrading to this superior copy.
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| The Last Dangerous Visions |
Ellison, Harlan, ed. The Last Dangerous Visions. Ashland, OR: Blackstone Publishing, 2024. First edition. The Last Dangerous Visions is the third and final installment in a series of speculative fiction anthologies edited by Harlan Ellison. It was preceded by Dangerous Visions (1967) and Again, Dangerous Visions (1972). The anthology was announced for publication in 1973, but was not published until 2024, six years after Ellison's death. Many of the anthology's contributors also died prior to publication. During the five-decade wait for its release, the title gained legendary status within the science fiction community as the genre's most famous unpublished book.
A J.R.R. Tolkien and Inklings Collector
A Tolkien and Inklings collector picked up several recent works of biography and criticism. He also picked up some older, scarce ephemera related to Tolkien's legendarium.
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| The Mythmakers |
Hendrix, John. The Mythmakers: The Remarkable Fellowship of C.S. Lewis & J.R.R. Tolkien (a Graphic Novel). New York: Abrams Fanfare, 2024. First edition. The Mythmakers is a graphic novel biography of Lewis and Tolkien which chronicles the parallels between their respective childhoods, military service during World War I, and their academic lives at Oxford.
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| Tolkien in the Twenty-First Century |
Groom, Nick. Tolkien in the Twenty-First Century: The Meaning of Middle Earth Today. New York: Pegasus Books, 2023. First edition. Groom traces the origins and inspirations of Tolkien's original books and explores the literary and film adaptations and how Tolkien's Middle-Earth has become a modern cultural phenomenon.
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| The Fellowship |
Zaleski, Philip and Carol Zaleski. The Fellowship: The Literary Lives of the Inklings. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2015. First edition. In The Fellowship, Philip and Carol Zaleski offer portraits of the four most prolific Inklings: J. R. R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Owen Barfield and Charles Williams.
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| Of Orc-Rags, Phials, & A Far Shore |
Palmer, Bruce. Of Orc-Rags, Phials, & A Far Shore: Visions of Paradise in The Lord of the Rings. Kansas City, MO: T-K Graphics, 1976. Of Orc-Rags, Phials, & A Far Shore is one of four fan-authored booklets issued by T-K Graphics between 1974 and 1977. It is an early example of Tolkien criticism and is often cited in reference guides and bibliographies of works on The Lord of the Rings.
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| J.R.R. Tolkien: The Hobbit |
Carter, Curtis. J.R.R. Tolkien: The Hobbit – Drawings, Watercolors, and Manuscripts. Milwaukee, WI: Marquette University, 1987. An exhibition brochure from the Patrick & Beatrice Haggerty Museum of Art, June 11 – September 30, 1987. Preface by Curtis Carter, Director of Haggerty Museum.
