Harcourt Amory Catalogue 1932

One of the nicest things in the collection is this rare bibliography, really a catalogue of a collection. In 1932 to mark the centenary celebrations of Lewis Carroll’s birth, Flora V Livingston of Harvard compiled a catalogue of the Harcourt Amory Collection of Lewis Carroll, part of the Harvard College Library holdings. Sixty five copies were printed of which fifty were for sale. A Christmas greetings signed by Livingston is loose inside. I don’t know who the recipient was. Also shown is a book of personal verse written by Harcourt Amory and inside are some newspaper cuttings of his poetic contributions, signed “ Sylvia Throstle” his pseudonym.

Lewis Carroll's Library - 3

Charlie Lovett’s Lewis Carroll among his Books – A Descriptive Catalogue of the Private Library of Charles l. Dodgson lists as No.2270, Williams, Henry Willard Our Eyes and How To Take Care of Them, Tegg, London 1871. This was first re-sold in the 1898 sale by the Art and Antiques Agency in Oxford shortly after the Brook’s sale of Dodgson’s effects and library and, as Lovett informs, is now in my collection. When I bought the book, a short text on ophthalmology, it had just been nicely housed in a clamshell box and sits well beside the other medical books from CLD’s library.

Some Mathematical Titles by Dodgson

At the Denis Crutch collection sale I also bought a copy of the second edition of Euclid and His Modern Rivals in original crimson cloth, one of 250 copies printed in 1885 ( lot 200). It would be six years later until I found a copy of the first edition (print run also 250 in 1879) on ABE books website, shown in the photograph. The work is a mathematical drama and described in WMGC 128.

On the same theme – mathematical works by C.L. Dodgson – the pictures also show two editions of Euclid Books I, II. Copies of these books are surprisingly rare and difficult to find. The title went through eight editions and would have literally poured into class rooms – where have they all gone?

Two editions, a first and third, of Curiosa Mathematica A New Theory of Parallels are shown, both acquired from book sellers in the UK. All of these mathematical books, without any special provenance or inscriptions and in good condition cost in the low three figures to buy. Later I will show rarer mathematical pamphlets and books.

Value and Rarity : Six Letters and Other Booklets

In collecting I found that studying the bibliographies for the rarer items was very stimulating. Certain tricks of the net became useful tools, for example entering various parts of a title into Google searches and finding items in bookseller itineries or catalogues. Sometimes these would be enticed in to view when the bookseller had mis-spelt the author’s name or other basic error. Today’s blog illustrates some items that also show that rare doesn’t equate to valuable. The India Alice, a booklet prepared for a Grolier Club dinner in 1966, describes the finding of one of the few 1865 Alice’s on the floor of a bookshop in Bangalore and its subsequent journey to Warren Weaver’s collection. This I held as especially desirable for a long time – a collecting whim – and when I spotted it in a literature catalogue one day I telephoned to secure it –but it had been sold that morning. Five years later I found this copy on eBay, with the dinner card of Lew Feldman still with it (the famous book dealer El Dieff) and a great inscription. Another rarity is the Six Letters – no 3 of only 26 copies printed; not valuable as such but try and find one! There are others which I will blog about in future posts.

Eldridge Johnson's Facsimile Edition of Alice's Adventures Under Ground

In 1936, Eldridge Johnson, who owned the original manuscript of Alice, written and drawn by Dodgson for Alice, commissioned Max Jaffe of Vienna to print a number of copies in collotype of a facsimile edition. The number is not known for certain but most people state 75 unnumbered copies in green morocco with a slipcase. Several other facsimile editions have been published but this one is the finest and nearest to the original, now housed in the British Library. The oval photograph of Alice Liddell that had been hidden for many years until it’s’ discovery by Morten Cohen, is shown on the last page, with the loose final leaf that came with the Johnson facsimile. Copies of this book today usually sell for £1000 plus, though I was lucky enough to get this copy for a fraction of that in 2000 on the internet.