First Editions

Ah, how wonderful it is to see you again dear reader. We’ve donned our smoking jackets and retired to the study to while away this grey afternoon and taken on quite a sophisticated air at Avant Garde, complete with proclamations of ‘Indeed’ and the occasional ‘What’ at the end of sentences for good measure. Ne’er-do-Well imperturbably refills his pipe by the warm open fire, Dandy nonchalantly swirls a glass of brandy and Rogue? Well I’ve been perusing and taking stock of our library.

For those with a distinct love for the written word nothing can quite compare with the happy hours spent with a good book, the thrill of tracking down a text to complete one’s collection or simply coming across some long forgotten tome that sparks both intrigue and imagination. Therefore the news I enjoyed this week was about Clive Hirschhorn and his £1 million collection of first editions.

Clive Hirschorn with first edition of Casino Royale

That’s right, a collection of 500 books with an estimated value of over a million are going to auction, sold on by the 72 yr old theatre critic to fund his retirement. Amongst the collection are literary classics like ‘The Great Gatsby’ (£75,000), ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ (£12,000) and an entire first edition collection of iconic James Bond novels expected to make at least £35 k. It’s all rather exciting because even though I could never hope to afford rare gems such as these (for now…) I’ll be interested in what they actually go for in auction this Thursday. However though the allure of a first edition is one that continues to have a hold on me I have to concede that, as Christopher Howse put it in his column for the Telegraph, first editions are “a kind of madness”.

Read Christopher’s article here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherhowse/7798284/Collecting-first-editions-is-a-kind-of-madness.html

All the Bond first editions

The adjective ‘madness’ is indeed apt dear reader because as nice as it would be to adorn our bookshelf with a prized first edition, actually reading the damn thing would probably cause irrevocable damage to the book and its value. In a comment to the New York Post Clive Hirschhorn said “Any scratch on them, any tear, any coffee stain, you can’t believe how much it will devalue a book”. Apparently a first edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone can fetch £30,000 if it’s in very good condition but as Christopher Howse points out “valuable copies are the ones nobody has read. It is like taking your shoes off when it rains” and when you think about it what’s the point in having a book that you can’t thumb through?

Christopher Morley, American journalist and novelist, famously said “Lord! when you sell a man a book you don't sell just twelve ounces of paper and ink and glue - you sell him a whole new life. Love and friendship and humour and ships at sea by night - there's all heaven and earth in a book, a real book.” And he’s absolutely right, a good book can transcend the boundaries of reality and human imagination, take you on a journey, make you think, make you laugh, make you cry (in a manly way obviously). A book’s real value is in its words and when you’re unable to read even them then what is the book really worth?

Top five most expensive books ever sold:

First folio by William Shakespeare: £3.8 million

The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer: £4.7 million

Birds of America by James Audubon: £7.2 million

The Gospels of Henry the Lion, Order of Saint Benedict: £7.3 million

The Codex Leicester, Leonardo da Vinci: £19.3 million

Still, collecting first editions proves a fashionable and altogether lavish pursuit, and if you fancy a whirl/ can find the money check out Abe books advice on tracking them down (basically anything with a 1 in it). http://www.abebooks.co.uk/books/RareBooks/collecting-guide/what_books_collect/collecting-first-editions.shtml

So have a root through the books on your bookshelf, novels hidden away in your attic, stacks piled in second hand vintage shops because you never know, you might just come across a hidden gem…. whether you read it or not we leave up to you. We’ll just leave you with the words of Samuel Butler: “The oldest books are still only just out to those who have not read them”.

Angelic Rogue