Online Catalogue #53
Our latest catalogue contains some important graphics and illustrated books, including a plate from William Blake’s masterpiece of engraving, Illustrations of the Book of Job (1826, one of only 100 copies after proofs); John Austin’s tinted lithograph, ‘Adelaide ... November 1849’, produced in the fledgling city; Zatta’s star charts of the northern and southern skies (1777); and Donovan’s Insects of India (1842), with 58 hand-coloured engravings.
Autograph material comes from across the board: George Fife Angas, Charles Blackman, Don Bradman, Sean Connery, Richard Nixon … and with accompanying artwork, we have Donald Friend, Pro Hart, John Olsen, and Albert Tucker.
Books of note include one of Winston Churchill’s rarest titles, India (1931); J.M. Barrie’s Peter and Wendy (1911, first edition with the dustwrapper); and Nabokov’s Laughter in the Dark (1938, first edition with the dustwrapper).
We’ll leave the rest for you to discover!
The Southern Australian. Volume 1, Number 29 (15 December 1838) + Number 30 (22 December 1838) + Volume 2, Number 52 (29 May 1839)
Adelaide, 1838 and 1839. George Fife Angas's personal copies of three early issues of South Australia's second newspaper, with his name and London address in ink at the head of the first page of each issue. These details are not in his hand; as the newspapers were posted to him..... More
The Practice of the New County Courts ...
London, Shaw, 1852 (fifth edition)/ 1847. Provenance: George Fife Angas, with his ownership signature ('G.F. Angas') in pencil at the head of the title page. The book has the (later) inkstamp of 'Herbert Angas Parsons, Solicitor, Adelaide' on the front endpaper; the name of George Fife Angas in pencil on..... More
The Lives of those Eminent Antiquaries Elias Ashmole, Esquire, and Mr William Lilly, written by themselves; containing, first, William Lilly's History of His Life and Times, with Notes, by Mr Ashmole: secondly, Lilly's Life and Death of Charles the First: and lastly, the Life of Elias Ashmole, Esquire. By way of Diary, with Several Occasional Letters, by ...
London, Printed for T. Davies, 1774. Elias Ashmole (1617-1692) 'was an English antiquary, politician, officer of arms, astrologer and student of alchemy.... Throughout his life he was an avid collector of curiosities and other artefacts. Many of these he acquired from the traveller, botanist, and collector John Tradescant the Younger..... More
'Adelaide, South Australia, from West end of Hindley Street - November 1849'
Adelaide, The Artist, 1849. 'John Baptist Austin produced the first lithographed view of Adelaide in 1849. The local press described it as "by an amateur" and lamented that "the signs of commercial activity ... convey no just idea of the stirring activity of Adelaide'. In spite of this it conceded..... More
New Art One. New Directions in Contemporary Australian Art. [Together with] New Art Two ... [to] New Art Eight
Roseville East, Craftsman House, 1992/ 1987, 1992/ 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992 and 1993. The complete series; all volumes are edited by Nevill Drury. The last volume is inscribed and signed by sculptor John Gardner (represented in the book); loosely inserted is the invitation (signed by Gardner) and price list..... More
Circular. Town Hall, Brighton, S.5, Victoria. 6th June, 1940 [drop title]
[Brighton, City of Brighton, 1940]. The pamphlet comprises facsimile copies of two circulars (dated 6 June and 28 June 1940) from E.M. Young, Mayor of Brighton, accompanying draft proposals (the first dated 1 October 1939) for a volunteer Municipal Reserve, similar to Britain's Home Guard, to be administered and resourced..... More
The Healing of Nerves
London, Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1901. The bookplate of the 'Societas Medica Londinensis' on the front pastedown is inscribed in ink 'Presented by the Authors'. Above it is the ownership signature (April 2011) of eminent Australian neurosurgeon Professor Donald Simpson AO (1927-2018). More
Peter and Wendy
London, Hodder and Stoughton, [1911] (first edition). The first edition of Barrie's best-loved work, and the fullest version of the Peter Pan story, it expands upon Barrie's play 'Peter Pan; or, the Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up', first performed in 1904 but not published until 1928. The character of Peter..... More
Endgame. A Play in One Act. Followed by Act without Words. A Mime for One Player
London, Faber and Faber, 1958 (first English edition, 'Translated from the original French by the author'). More
Waiting for Godot. A Tragicomedy in Two Acts
London, Faber and Faber Limited, February 1956 (second impression)/ February 1956 (first English edition). More
A late-nineteenth century album containing 36 photographs of cities, sites and scenes across Belgium
The photographs (image size approximately 120 × 190 mm) are mounted one per page on both sides of thick card leaves, with printed borders and captions. All the usual suspects are there: Brussells, Bruges, Waterloo, Louvain, Dinant, Ypres ... but with the passage of time, the best would have to..... More
A pair of posters for 'The Famous, Original and Only | Lynch | Family | Bellringers | Glassophonists'
The posters (each 1010 × 380 mm) advertise this family of 'Instrumentalists, Vocalists & Comedians' and its supporting acts promising 'Character & Comedy, Scenas & Dances' - verily, a 'great success throughout the civilized world'. Printed by F.W. Niven Pty. Ltd., Printers, Lithographers, &c., Flinders Street, Melbourne, circa 1900 (one..... More
Ornamental Caskets. Eight Centuries of European Craftsmanship. Inventory Catalogue of the Hans Schell Collection / Prunk-Kassetten. Europäeische Meisterwerke aus acht Jahrhunderten. Hans Schell Collection, Graz
Stuttgart, Arnoldsche Verlagsanstalt GmbH, 1998. The text is in both German and English; an exhibition flyer is loosely inserted. More
Little Big Man
London, Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1965 (first English edition)/ 1964. More
The Dark Monarch. A Portrait from Within
London, The Galley Press, 1962. Sven Berlin (1911-1999), conscientious objector, soldier, artist, and poet, published his war memoir, 'I am Lazarus', in 1961. Its 'psychobiographic' sequel was published in the autumn of 1962, and 'after a few weeks and a flurry of libel actions, withdrawn. Since that time, a few..... More
The Art of Charles Blackman
London, Andre Deutsch Limited, 1989. Signed on the flyleaf by Charles Blackman (late in life). More
Charles Blackman. Alice in Wonderland
Melbourne, National Gallery of Victoria, 2006. A lavish catalogue issued in conjunction with an exhibition of the same name, held at the Ian Potter Centre, August-October 2006. A cloth-bound edition published simultaneously sold out at the time. More
'Then the Lord answered Job out of the Whirlwind' [Plate 13 from 'Illustrations of the Book of Job']
London, William Blake [for John Linnell], 'Published as the Act directs March 8: 1825' [in fact 1826]. 'William Blake's "Illustrations of the Book of Job" primarily refers to a series of twenty-two engraved prints (published 1826) by Blake illustrating the biblical Book of Job. It also refers to two earlier..... More
The Philosophical Works of the late Right Honorable Henry St John, Lord Viscount Bolingbroke, in Five Volumes
London, David Mallet, 1754 (first collected octavo edition). Each volume contains the armorial bookplate of A.R. Downer, Sir Alexander 'Alick' Russell Downer (1910-1981), politician and diplomat. He was the Minister for Immigration under Menzies from 1958, and the Australian High Commissioner in London from 1963 to 1972. Henry St John..... More
Napoleon in Caricature, 1794-1821
London, John Lane, The Bodley Head, 1911. Both volumes bear the ownership signature of James Richard Fowler (1865-1939), of the Adelaide-based wholesale grocery dynasty. More
Boswell's Life of Johnson. Together with Boswell's Journey of a Tour to the Hebrides and Johnson's Diary of a Journey into North Wales. Edited by George Birkbeck Hill. Revised and Enlarged Edition by L.F. Powell. In Six Volumes. [Together with] The Letters of Samuel Johnson, with Mrs Thrale's Genuine Letters to Him. Collected and edited by R.W. Chapman [in three volumes]
Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1934 and 1952 [first thus]. [9 items]. More
Australia Unlimited
Melbourne, George Robertson and Company Propy. Ltd., [1918] (see page 1075 in passing). Edwin James Brady (1869-1952), journalist and writer, uses the introduction to this work to introduce himself as much as anything: 'My work on "Australia Unlimited" began definitely with the year 1912.... I had spent many years in..... More
The Wild Orchids of Britain
London, The Bodley Head, 1950. Number 167 of 1100 copies of the edition in buckram. More
Report on the Country recently examined in the Davenport and Murchison Ranges along the Frew River and eastward of Tennant's Creek
Adelaide, Government Printer, 1903. Primarily a geological report, with interesting general observations scattered throughout. More