View allAll Photos Tagged FirstEditions,
Quoting from the blurb on the dustjacket:
“Bold, imaginative and packed with excitement, STAR WARS is destined to become a classic in the genre. This is the novel that brings that ‘sense of wonder’ back to science fiction – each page brimming with heroic adventure, unexpected marvels and amazing characters…”
For sure! Little did they realize how really huge it would become.
Electric Drive
98° Motor Show Brussels
Autosalon Brussel
Salon de l'Auto Bruxelles
Brussels - Belgium
January 2020
“The Doctor was sitting in his easy-chair by the fireside and his young wife was on a stool at his feet.” [Quote from the text]
Dr. Strong is the headmaster of the school which David attends in Canterbury. David tentatively enters, unseen for the moment by the Strongs, as the elderly scholar reads aloud from a manuscript, and his young wife, Annie, looks up at him in rapt attention.
“David Copperfield” is one of Dickens’ most popular and critically acclaimed novels. The story follows David’s life from childhood to maturity and many of its elements follow events in Dickens’ own life, especially in the early chapters describing David’s provincial upbringing. The story is filled with vivid characters such as Uriah Heep, Mr. Micawber, the Pegottys, and eccentric Aunt Betsey and it ranks as the finest of Dickens’ works. “Of all my books,” Dickens wrote in the preface to the 1867 edition, “I like this the best… like many fond parents, I have in my heart of hearts a favourite child. And his name is David Copperfield.”
Publisher Bradbury & Evans first released the story in monthly parts from May, 1849 through November, 1850, and in book form in 1850. The text was embellished with full-page, black & white engravings by H. K. Browne (“Phiz”). Subscribers who wished a hardcover edition for their libraries would either purchase a copy from the publisher when available or have the serial parts bound into book form, often in leather.
Mark Twain penned the following inscription on the inside front cover: “Dear Mrs. Doubleday: This book has wandered into my hands, & as it is too delicate & pretty for a person like me, & just right for a person like you, I wish to beg you to take it. With the affectionate regards of a long-time friend – to wit S. L. Clemens. New York, Xmas 1906.”
The recipient was undoubtedly the naturalist Neltje Doubleday, the wife of his good friend the publisher Frank N. Doubleday. Merle Johnson, in his “A Bibliography of the Works of Mark Twain,” states that this book was “published anonymously August 20, 1906… for the author…Copies of the work were distributed privately to the author’s personal friends and public acknowledgement of authorship was withheld until after his death.”
“Cast aside by the man who had claimed her virginity, desirable Georgia was out to take every man she met for all she could get! Her amorous adventures make a thrilling story, as told in modern language – with no holds barred. Even a murder charge could not dim the passion of the hot-blooded redhead from Georgia!
PASSIONATE
“Many men had made love to the voluptuous and beautiful redhead, but Georgia loved no man – save one! Of her many lovers, that one man, Charles Russell, was the only one who had taken her and had given nothing in return! Seeking the happiness that had always eluded her, Georgia flitted from man to man, only to wind up in court – charged with the murder of her impotent husband. The scandal that was uncovered only served to add to the glamour of the luscious Georgia.
“A smile from Georgia, a kiss from Georgia – that was all her lovers needed to know that hers was A Body to Own.” [From the Introduction]
[Note: Ecstasy Novels weren’t pornographic, but they did depict men and women hitting the sheets before or outside of marriage.]
Before radio, television, the internet and smart phones, magic was a popular form of home entertainment, along with amateur theatrics and parlor games.
This is a charming book about dragons. Combining fact with fantasy and science with romance, Dickinson sets out to prove that dragons really did exist. First published in 1979, "The Flight of the Dragon" presents a riveting thesis on how so great a creature as the dragon actually managed to fly. It's filled to the brim with wonderful illustrations by Wayne Anderson.
Car: Lotus Emira V6 First Edition.
Engine: 3456cc V6.
Year of manufacture: 2022.
Date of first registration in the UK: 7th December 2022.
Place of registration: Not known.
Date of last MOT: Not applicable.
Mileage at last MOT: Not applicable.
Date of last change of keeper: No previous recorded keepers.
Number of previous keepers: 0.
Date taken: 17th September 2023.
From the Introduction on the first page:
THE PUPPET THAT ROCKED THE UNIVERSE
Don Haig had been content to lie around and drink in the synthetic beauty of the pleasure planetoid Fyon, until a woman came into his life. A woman more beautiful and more perfect than any other female in the galaxy. A woman who brought about a curious change in Don.
For she was a pocket-size doll – a very strange and miraculous puppet who shed constant tears and held powers that Don never even dreamed of.
But what Don did know was that dangerous alien forces were swiftly focusing on him and his living puppet – and that he had to discover the doll’s super-scientific secret before his own life was smashed to atoms.
1944 March; A Short History of the Army and Navy by Fletcher Pratt.. First Edition with twenty-four Maps. Infantry Journal.
A cute 1940s children's book about a little forgetful bear.
Forgetful Bear.
Written by Nancy Raymond
Illustrated by Frank Harper
Published by Fideler Company, First Edition 1943
From "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" by L. Frank Baum. Art by W. W. Denslow. Chicago: Geo. M. Hill, 1900. 1st ed.
Few Americans are unfamiliar with this century-old children’s tale. A cyclone carries Dorothy from her home in Kansas into the magical Land of Oz where she meets the scarecrow, the tin woodman, and the cowardly lion. Their adventures looking for the Emerald City and the Wizard have become a permanent part of American popular culture. Baum’s work is illustrated by W. W. Denslow and features 24 inserted color plates and many black & white drawings. Denslow’s artwork was an obvious inspiration for the look and feel of the 1939 film starring Judy Garland as Dorothy.
Karel van Mander, Het Schilder-Boeck (Haarlem: Paschier van Wesbusch, 1604), first edition in two volumes with added illustrations, 21 x 16.7 x 5.8 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
Car: Lotus Emira V6 First Edition.
Engine: 3456cc V6.
Power: 400 BHP.
Fuel: Petrol.
Year of manufacture: 2022.
Date of first registration in the UK: 7th December 2022.
Place of registration: Not kmown.
Date first MOT due: 6th December 2025.
Date of last V5 issued: 30th January 2023.
Date taken: 1st September 2024.
Doughty’s short-lived magazine “The Cabinet of Natural History and American Rural Sports” is an important imprint in the history of American printing. It contained the first colored sporting prints made in America. Issued in monthly parts and published from the end of 1830 until the spring of 1834, “The Cabinet” featured articles on hunting, detailed descriptions of newly discovered flora and fauna, and some of the finest examples of early American hand-colored lithography. It was originally the work of the Doughty brothers, Thomas and John, with virtually all of the plates being the work of Thomas, who also founded the Hudson River School. But, by the spring of 1832, the partnership had broken up and Thomas had moved to Boston. An abbreviated third volume (not included here) lacked Thomas’ touch.
With 43 illustrations by R. Seymour and Phiz (H. K. Browne).
Charles Dickens' first novel.
Dickens was working as a Parliamentary reporter and a roving journalist at age 24, and he had published a collection of sketches on London life as “Sketches by Boz.” Publisher Chapman & Hall was projecting a series of "cockney sporting plates" by illustrator Robert Seymour. There was to be a club, the members of which were to be sent on hunting and fishing expeditions into the country. Their guns were to go off by accident, and fishhooks were to get caught in their hats and trousers, and these and other misadventures were to be depicted in Seymour's comic plates. They asked Dickens to supply the description necessary to explain the plates and to connect them into a sort of picture novel that was fashionable at the time. He protested that he knew nothing of sport, but still accepted the commission.
Only in a few instances did Dickens adjust his narrative to plates that had been prepared for him. Typically, he led the way with an installment of his story, and the artist was compelled to illustrate what Dickens had already written. The story thus became the prime source of interest and the illustrations merely of secondary importance. Seymour provided the illustrations for the first two installments before his suicide. Robert William Buss illustrated the third installment, but Dickens did not like his work, so the remaining installments were illustrated by Phiz (Hablot Knight Browne) who illustrated most of Dickens' subsequent novels. The installments were first published in book form in 1837. [Source: Wikipedia]
Thunderball is the ninth book in Ian Fleming’s James Bond series. James Bond is in disgrace. His monthly medical report is critical of the high living that is ruining his health, and M packs him off to a nature clinic to be tuned-up to his former state of exceptional fitness. Furiously, Bond undergoes the shame of the carrot juice and nut-cutlet regime – and thereby upsets the plans of SPECTRE, a new adversary, more deadly, more ruthless even than Smersh.
The image is from the 14th Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1892-93, by J. W. Powell, Director, Part 2. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1896. The description which follows summarizes the detailed information accompanying the image in the report.
According to the official report for 1892, the Navajo Indians living in Northern New Mexico and Arizona numbered somewhat over 16,000 souls and had, in round numbers, 9,000 cattle, 119,000 horses, and 1,600,000 sheep and goats. Being rich in herds and wealth in silver, the Navajo felt no special need of a redeemer and the doctrinal seed of the Ghost Dance had fallen on barren ground. The Navajo were skeptical, laughed at the prophets, and paid but little attention to the prophesies.
This edition of the novel contains six color illustrations by Pamela Colman Smith. The book was first published in the US in 1966 under the title “The Garden of Evil” by Paperback Library. In 1988, it was adapted into a film by Ken Russell.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4Q-PyZxZjw
“The Lair of the White Worm” was Bram Stoker’s twelfth and last novel, published a year before his death. The novel, along with “The Jewel of Seven Stars, is one of his most famous after “Dracula.” It is a horror story about a giant white worm that can transform itself into a woman. Partly based on the legend of the Lambton Worm from North East England, the White Worm in Stoker’s story is a large snake-like creature that dwells in a hole or pit and feeds on whatever is thrown to it. It is thought to reside in the house of Arabella March, a local lady and a suspect in numerous crimes that cannot be proven.
This edition of the novel contains six color illustrations by Pamela Colman Smith. The book was first published in the US in 1966 under the title “The Garden of Evil” by Paperback Library. In 1988, it was adapted into a film by Ken Russell.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4Q-PyZxZjw
“The Lair of the White Worm” was Bram Stoker’s twelfth and last novel, published a year before his death. The novel, along with “The Jewel of Seven Stars, is one of his most famous after “Dracula.” It is a horror story about a giant white worm that can transform itself into a woman. Partly based on the legend of the Lambton Worm from North East England, the White Worm in Stoker’s story is a large snake-like creature that dwells in a hole or pit and feeds on whatever is thrown to it. It is thought to reside in the house of Arabella March, a local lady and a suspect in numerous crimes that cannot be proven.
The novelist Ernest Hemingway once remarked that “all modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn,” and other writers such as poet T. S. Eliot and African American novelist Ralph Ellison have added their acclaim. Mark Twain, the pen name of Samuel Clemens, worked for eight years on the story of an outcast white boy, Huck, and his adult friend Jim, a runaway slave, who together flee Missouri on a raft down the Mississippi River in the 1840s. The book has been controversial since the day it was published, opinions ranging from “the book is a masterpiece” to the book is “trash and suitable only for the slums.” The free-spirited and not always truthful Huck narrates the colorful stories in the book in his own coarse and ungrammatical voice. He shows a lack of respect for religion and adult authority and repeatedly uses the “n” word. Some readers view the book as satire and consider it a powerful attack on racism. Others believe it contributes to a “racially hostile environment” and are offended by the language and the portrayal of the slave Jim. In spite of it all, Huck Finn remains the Great American Novel to the many people who have read it and loved it.
“Suspension Chloriforeene,” as presented by Anderson and his son, from a lithograph used by him on his return from the Continent, December, 1848. From the Harry Houdini Collection.
This month each member read some favourite poetry aloud... a change from the usual format, where we usually all read a specific book.... & earnestly discuss it. Good stories and memories today .
i read a couple of verses of Longfellow's Evangeline...my mother's copy...which I always loved because of the story's location in Grand Pre', Nova Scotia...near where I lived as a child. " This is the forest primeval "
This is one of five book groups in our local branch of the Canadian Federation of University Women ( membership not limited to university grads...)
Not everyone present is in today's photos.
First time visit for this group to Chris's home ( a newer member)...I especially chose this lovely old teacup...labelled Nippon on the bottom ( haven't seen that designation for a long time.......and I liked her silver...the Coronation pattern....I had a baby set of this cutlery, when I was a chid ....several decades ago ( The Coronation of George VI, and Queen Elizabeth...not the present one, I ought to add! )
a little bit about the use of Nippon, from Wikipedia :
" In English, the modern official title of the country is simply "Japan", one of the few nation-states to have no "long form" name. The official Japanese-language name is Nippon koku or Nihon koku (日本国), literally "Country of Japan". From the Meiji Restoration until the end of World War II, the full title of Japan was the "Great Empire of Japan" (大日本帝國 Dai Nippon Teikoku). (A more poetic rendering of the name of Japan during this period was "Empire of the Sun.") The official name of the nation was changed after the adoption of the post-war constitution; the title "State of Japan" is sometimes used as a colloquial modern-day equivalent.
Though Nippon or Nihon are still by far the most popular names for Japan from within the country, recently the foreign words Japan and even Jipangu (from Cipangu, see below) have been used in Japanese mostly for the purpose of foreign branding."
Stephanie of Hohenzollern was Queen of Portugal from May 1858 to July 1859.
The Illustrated News of the World – First Edition 1858.
‘The Illustrated News of the World and National Portrait Gallery of Eminent Personages’ was a new publication with the strong visual emphasis of numerous large woodcuts to illustrate local and world events, and also featuring a number of fine steel engravings of eminent persons. The publishers stated their hopes that the publication would match or supplement the existing illustrated magazines:- The Illustrated London News and Punch Magazine .
Published by Illustrated News of the World, The Strand, London. Annual bound collection, red cloth boards 338 pages 42cm x 29cm.
This first-edition children's book by renowned illustrated Eric Carle contains all manner of creatures from the natural world.
From "Rip Van Winkle" by Washington Irving. London: William Heinemann, 1905. First Rackham Trade Edition.
The story is of the devious pursuit of Cthulhu, the search for his lair in sunken R'lyeh, of the danger from Cthulhu's minions ever wary of detection and disclosure. It begns in a house on Curwen Street in legend-haunted Arkham, Massachusetts. It ends on a shunned and mysterious island in the South Pacific, after having ranged from the Inca ruins near Machu Pichu to London, from the Nameless City of Irem to Singapore, in a colorful and dramatic sequence of events which in sum fit into place more pieces in the mosaic of the Cthulhu Mythos.
The Cthulhu Mythos is a shared fictional universe, based on the work of American horror writer H. P. Lovecraft. The term was first coined by August Derleth, a contemporary correspondent of Lovecraft, who used the name of the creature Cthulhu—a central figure in Lovecraft literature and the focus of Lovecraft's short story "The Call of Cthulhu" (first published in pulp magazine Weird Tales in 1928)—to identify the system of lore employed by Lovecraft and his literary successors. Authors of Lovecraftian horror use elements of the Mythos in an ongoing expansion of the fictional universe. [Source: Wikipedia]
“The Gift” was an annual literary anthology published in a gift book format for the years 1836, 1837, 1839, 1840, and 1842-1845. Each book was published by Carey & Hart of Philadelphia in the fall of the year prior to the date given in the title, so that The Gift for 1836 was actually issued in October of 1835. Five of the gift books include new tales by Edgar Allan Poe – “Manuscript Found in a Bottle” (1836), “William Wilson” (1840), “Eleonora” (1842), “The Pit and the Pendulum” (1843), and “The Purloined Letter” (1845).
This is a 1940s lovely version of Rudyard Kipling's tale accompanied with charming illustrations by F. Rojankovsky.
When the smooth-skinned rhinoceros steals a cake from the Parsee (``from whose hat the rays of the sun were reflected in more-than-oriental splendor'') he gets his just desserts--that is, cake crumbs deposited inside his skin. The itch causes him to rub and rub himself against a tree, until he becomes as wrinkled as we know him today.
From "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" by L. Frank Baum. Art by W. W. Denslow. Chicago: Geo. M. Hill, 1900. 1st ed.
Few Americans are unfamiliar with this century-old children’s tale. A cyclone carries Dorothy from her home in Kansas into the magical Land of Oz where she meets the scarecrow, the tin woodman, and the cowardly lion. Their adventures looking for the Emerald City and the Wizard have become a permanent part of American popular culture. Baum’s work is illustrated by W. W. Denslow and features 24 inserted color plates and many black & white drawings. Denslow’s artwork was an obvious inspiration for the look and feel of the 1939 film starring Judy Garland as Dorothy.
Car: Lotus Emira V6 First Edition.
Engine: 3456cc V6.
Power: 400 BHP.
Year of manufacture: 2022.
Date of first registration in the UK: 7th December 2022.
Place of registration: Not kmown.
Date first MOT due: 6th December 2025.
Date of last V5 issued: 30th January 2023.
Date taken: 1st June 2024.
This is plate 14 in Gaspey’s “Book of the World,” which contains 35 full-page, hand-colored engravings. Colored engravings of that period were virtually always colored by hand with water colors.
"Greater Magic: A Practical Treatise on Modern Magic" was released in 1938 as an encyclopedia of magic intended specifically for magicians, not the general public. It was only distributed and advertised within the conjuring world. It covers magic with cards, silks, billiard balls, sponge balls, cups & balls, coins, cigarettes and cigars, bills, ropes, the linking rings, mind reading, magic squares, apparatus magic, stage illusions, and more.
It contains 715 effects, contributed by over 100 magicians, including some of the greatest names of the day. It is a massive tome, with 1030 pages and 1120 illustrations. The illustrations are by Dr. Harlan Tarbell, foremost illustrator of magic, and a famous professional magician.
"Praise God from whom all blessings flow,
Praise Him all creatures here below,
Praise Him above ye Heavenly Host,
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
Amen."
Burnett’s story of a sickly and unloved 10-year-old orphan who finds joy and happiness in her secret garden is a classic of English children’s literature and one of Burnett’s best-known works.
Although the first appearance of Richard Matheson’s “I Am Legend” was in this modest paperback, it became the basis for 3 subsequent motion pictures: “The Last Man on Earth” (1964) with Vincent Price, “The Omega Man” (1971) with Charlton Heston, and “I Am Legend” (2007) with Will Smith. It was also the inspiration behind George Romero’s “Night of the Living Dead” (1968). The concept of a worldwide viral apocalypse giving rise to zombies originated in Matheson’s book.
The astronauts who have signed the page are Alan Shepard, John Glenn, Scott Carpenter, Wally Schirra, Gordon Cooper, and Deke Slayton. Gus Grissom, who was also a Mercury astronaut, died tragically in the Apollo I Command Module on January 27, 1967 when it caught fire during a pre-launch test on Launch Pad 34 at Cape Kennedy.
The Mercury Seven were the group of seven Mercury astronauts selected by NASA on April 9, 1959. They are also referred to as the Original Seven or Astronaut Group 1. They piloted the manned spaceflights of the Mercury program from May 1961 to May 1963. Alan Shepard was the second person and the first American to travel into space. Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin was the first person to travel into space.
The story of the macho, seat-of-the-pants approach to the space program of the Mercury astronauts and the equally fearless approach of test pilot Chuck Yeager was the basis of a book by Tom Wolfe (1979) and a movie by Philip Kaufman (1983). Both are titled “The Right Stuff.” Here is a link to the movie trailer:
This crime novel about a diabolical hound on Dartmoor is one of the UK's best loved novels and the top Sherlock Holmes story.
From "The Rhinegold & The Valkyrie" by Richard Wagner. New York: Doubleday Page & Co., 1910. First American Edition
"It seemed scarcely bearable to leave such delightfulness."
Burnett’s story of a sickly and unloved 10-year-old orphan who finds joy and happiness in her secret garden is a classic of English children’s literature and one of Burnett’s best-known works.
From the book "Peter and Wendy" by J. M. Barrie. London: Hodder & Stoughton, (1911). First edition. This is the first book that tells the story of Peter Pan, Wendy and their exploits in Neverland along with the now familiar cast of characters that includes Captain Hook, Tinker Bell, the Lost Boys and Tiger Lily.
From "The Rhinegold & The Valkyrie" by Richard Wagner. New York: Doubleday Page & Co., 1910. First American Edition
In this, the fifteenth book in Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan series, Tarzan faces Soviet agents seeking revenge and a lost tribe descended from early Christians practicing a bizarre and debased religious cult. The story first appeared as a serial in the Blue Book magazine from October, 1931 through March, 1932.