The Speckled Band : An Adventure of Sherlock Holmes - The original Royal Adelphi Theatre program. -
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
1910 - Adelphi Theatre, London
‘Special Cable to The New York Times. London, June 4. -- Sherlock Holmes came to life ton-night on the stage of the Adelphi Theatre in an adaptation of Conan Doyle’s story called “The Speckled Band.” It will be remembered that the mysterious title refers to a snake trained by its master to do murders. The reptile made three appearances to-night, finally killing its master in a scene so horrible that even Holmes had little chance. Lyn Harding, as a half-mad Anglo Indian villain, with the horrid pet, held the stage in a fashion evidently delightful to the gallery. Doyle responded to frantic calls with a bow.’
Here we present a rare original programme from that show which only ran for two months, with H. A. Saintsbury playing Sherlock Holmes and a very large rock boa which rather stole the show playing the part of the serpent. The play was transferred to the Globe on August 8th of 1910. In near fine condition and enclosed in separate magnificent colour art-nouveau covers.
‘[Doyle] took a six-month lease on the Adelphi Theatre so that The House of Temperley [based on his novel ‘Rodney Stone’] might be produced. The death of the King and a serious slump in audience attendance, coupled with the subject which was not thought suitable for women, meant that the run was short.
'When I saw the course that things were taking I shut myself up and devoted my whole mind to making a sensational Sherlock Holmes drama. I wrote it in a week and called it ‘The Speckled Band’ after the short story of that name. I do not think that I exaggerate if I say that within a fortnight of the one play shutting down I had a company working upon the rehearsals of a second one, which had been written in the interval' (Memories and Adventures, p. 101).
The new play was a great success.’ – Green and Gibson, A Bibliography of A Conan Doyle.
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Price HK$ 6,000
1910 - Adelphi Theatre, London
‘Special Cable to The New York Times. London, June 4. -- Sherlock Holmes came to life ton-night on the stage of the Adelphi Theatre in an adaptation of Conan Doyle’s story called “The Speckled Band.” It will be remembered that the mysterious title refers to a snake trained by its master to do murders. The reptile made three appearances to-night, finally killing its master in a scene so horrible that even Holmes had little chance. Lyn Harding, as a half-mad Anglo Indian villain, with the horrid pet, held the stage in a fashion evidently delightful to the gallery. Doyle responded to frantic calls with a bow.’Here we present a rare original programme from that show which only ran for two months, with H. A. Saintsbury playing Sherlock Holmes and a very large rock boa which rather stole the show playing the part of the serpent. The play was transferred to the Globe on August 8th of 1910. In near fine condition and enclosed in separate magnificent colour art-nouveau covers.
‘[Doyle] took a six-month lease on the Adelphi Theatre so that The House of Temperley [based on his novel ‘Rodney Stone’] might be produced. The death of the King and a serious slump in audience attendance, coupled with the subject which was not thought suitable for women, meant that the run was short.
'When I saw the course that things were taking I shut myself up and devoted my whole mind to making a sensational Sherlock Holmes drama. I wrote it in a week and called it ‘The Speckled Band’ after the short story of that name. I do not think that I exaggerate if I say that within a fortnight of the one play shutting down I had a company working upon the rehearsals of a second one, which had been written in the interval' (Memories and Adventures, p. 101).
The new play was a great success.’ – Green and Gibson, A Bibliography of A Conan Doyle.
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Price HK$ 6,000
The Speckled Band, An Adventure of Sherlock Holmes -
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
1929 - Samuel French, London - First Edition, Fourth Impression. (&lsquo
Scarce early edition of Doyle’s gothic-themed Sherlock Holmes locked room mystery.. With five full page schematics for the stage plot, followed by the properties plot and the electric and lime plot at the rear of the book.
‘The Adventure of the Speckled Band’ had first appeared in Strand Magazine in February 1892, and was later collected as the eighth story in ‘The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes’. After Doyle’s successful stage adaptation of 1910, with the celebrated actor H.A. Saintsbury as Holmes and Claude King as Dr. Watson, it was committed to print by Samuel French in 1912. The play toured, and was also performed in America, with Saintsury returning in the London revival of 1921.
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Price HK$ 2,000
1929 - Samuel French, London - First Edition, Fourth Impression. (&lsquo
Scarce early edition of Doyle’s gothic-themed Sherlock Holmes locked room mystery.. With five full page schematics for the stage plot, followed by the properties plot and the electric and lime plot at the rear of the book.‘The Adventure of the Speckled Band’ had first appeared in Strand Magazine in February 1892, and was later collected as the eighth story in ‘The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes’. After Doyle’s successful stage adaptation of 1910, with the celebrated actor H.A. Saintsbury as Holmes and Claude King as Dr. Watson, it was committed to print by Samuel French in 1912. The play toured, and was also performed in America, with Saintsury returning in the London revival of 1921.
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Price HK$ 2,000
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes -
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
1949 - John Murray, London - Uniform Edition
Doyle’s first short story collection, twelve in total including A Scandal in Bohemia, introducing Irene Adler and The Speckled Band. These classic Sherlock Holmes stories all initially appeared in The Strand Magazine.
When the publisher Newnes accepted a Doyle piece for the very first issue in 1891, he did so with the hope that it would provide him access, through Doyle's agent, to another writer in the agent's stable - Rudyard Kipling - but then beginning in the very first year, "Sherlock Holmes" took off and The Strand was a success.
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Price HK$ 3,000
1949 - John Murray, London - Uniform Edition
Doyle’s first short story collection, twelve in total including A Scandal in Bohemia, introducing Irene Adler and The Speckled Band. These classic Sherlock Holmes stories all initially appeared in The Strand Magazine.When the publisher Newnes accepted a Doyle piece for the very first issue in 1891, he did so with the hope that it would provide him access, through Doyle's agent, to another writer in the agent's stable - Rudyard Kipling - but then beginning in the very first year, "Sherlock Holmes" took off and The Strand was a success.
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Price HK$ 3,000
The Trilogy of Desire: The Financier; The Titan; The Stoic. -
Theodore Dreiser
1912 - Harper &, New York - First Editions
A complete first edition set of Dreiser’s ‘Trilogy of Desire’, also known as ‘The Cowperwood Trilogy’, telling the life story of Charles T. Yerkes, renamed Algernon Cowperwood by Dreiser, a Philadelphia securities manipulator and streetcar magnate. ‘The Financier’, the first of the trilogy, in scarce and unrestored dust jacket.
‘It is Mr. Dreiser's constant probing of the intertwined needs for money, art, glory, sex and so much else that makes "The Financier" the greatest of all American business novels.’ - The Wall Street Journal, 2012.
‘Dreiser laboriously researched the business practices and personal exploits of real-life robber baron Charles Yerkes to narrate Frank Algernon Cowperwood's early career in ‘The Financier’, which explores the unscrupulous world of finance from the Civil War through the panic incited by the 1871 Chicago fire.’ (University of Illinois). Despite claiming complete ignorance about finance and an inability to make money, Dreiser presents a technical masterpiece.
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Price HK$ 62,000
1912 - Harper &, New York - First Editions
A complete first edition set of Dreiser’s ‘Trilogy of Desire’, also known as ‘The Cowperwood Trilogy’, telling the life story of Charles T. Yerkes, renamed Algernon Cowperwood by Dreiser, a Philadelphia securities manipulator and streetcar magnate. ‘The Financier’, the first of the trilogy, in scarce and unrestored dust jacket.‘It is Mr. Dreiser's constant probing of the intertwined needs for money, art, glory, sex and so much else that makes "The Financier" the greatest of all American business novels.’ - The Wall Street Journal, 2012.
‘Dreiser laboriously researched the business practices and personal exploits of real-life robber baron Charles Yerkes to narrate Frank Algernon Cowperwood's early career in ‘The Financier’, which explores the unscrupulous world of finance from the Civil War through the panic incited by the 1871 Chicago fire.’ (University of Illinois). Despite claiming complete ignorance about finance and an inability to make money, Dreiser presents a technical masterpiece.
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Price HK$ 62,000
Sister Carrie -
Theodore Dreiser, Reginald Marsh (illustrator)
1939 - The Limited Editions Club, New York - First Edition illustrated by Marsh, Number 1194 of 1500 copies.
A handsomely bound limited edition, signed by the illustrator, with an introduction by Burton Rascoe and illustrated throughout from crayon drawings by Reginald Marsh
Banned on publication for its questionable morals, Sister Carrie is the great American novel of seduction, a masterpiece of insight into appetite and innocence.
Long before she was seduced by the cautious and ordinary man whose life she would unravel with no malice and only intermittent interest, the young Carrie Meeber was seduced by the promise of the city–its vitality and reckless possibility, the thrill of material luxury, and the spectacle of power and industry.
Selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best novels of all time.
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Price HK$ 4,000
1939 - The Limited Editions Club, New York - First Edition illustrated by Marsh, Number 1194 of 1500 copies.
A handsomely bound limited edition, signed by the illustrator, with an introduction by Burton Rascoe and illustrated throughout from crayon drawings by Reginald MarshBanned on publication for its questionable morals, Sister Carrie is the great American novel of seduction, a masterpiece of insight into appetite and innocence.
Long before she was seduced by the cautious and ordinary man whose life she would unravel with no malice and only intermittent interest, the young Carrie Meeber was seduced by the promise of the city–its vitality and reckless possibility, the thrill of material luxury, and the spectacle of power and industry.
Selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best novels of all time.
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Price HK$ 4,000
Rebecca -
Daphne Du Maurier
1938 - Victor Gollancz Limited, London - First Edition
‘Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.’
A finely bound first edition of this iconic gothic mystery, the source for Alfred Hitchcock's haunting cinematic adaptation, produced in 1940. Part of Queen's Quorum, and a Haycraft-Queen cornerstone mystery.
Considered du Maurier’s finest work, the novel is narrated by the second Mrs de Winters, the naive second wife of wealthy widower, Maxim de Winter, owner of the renowned estate, Manderley. As the story unfolds, the second Mrs de Winter increasingly finds herself haunted by her glamorous predecessor, Rebecca, and tormented by the sinister housekeeper, Mrs Danvers, subsequently leading her to uncover an unexpected tragedy...
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Price HK$ 10,000
1938 - Victor Gollancz Limited, London - First Edition
‘Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.’A finely bound first edition of this iconic gothic mystery, the source for Alfred Hitchcock's haunting cinematic adaptation, produced in 1940. Part of Queen's Quorum, and a Haycraft-Queen cornerstone mystery.
Considered du Maurier’s finest work, the novel is narrated by the second Mrs de Winters, the naive second wife of wealthy widower, Maxim de Winter, owner of the renowned estate, Manderley. As the story unfolds, the second Mrs de Winter increasingly finds herself haunted by her glamorous predecessor, Rebecca, and tormented by the sinister housekeeper, Mrs Danvers, subsequently leading her to uncover an unexpected tragedy...
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Price HK$ 10,000
Jorkens Remembers Africa -
Lord Dunsany [pseud. Edward Plunkett]
1934 - Longmans Green and Co., New York - Toronto - First Edition
A fine edition of Lord Dunsany’s second collection of ‘extraordinary’ short stories recounted by the enterprising and adventurous Jorkens at the Billiard Club. In the delicate dust jacket, without repairs or restoration. ‘Extraordinary’ as indicated by the fabulous Allen Lewis illustration of Jorkens fending off a unicorn with his hunting rifle which adorns the dust jacket and also the illustrated title page.
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Price HK$ 4,600
1934 - Longmans Green and Co., New York - Toronto - First Edition
A fine edition of Lord Dunsany’s second collection of ‘extraordinary’ short stories recounted by the enterprising and adventurous Jorkens at the Billiard Club. In the delicate dust jacket, without repairs or restoration. ‘Extraordinary’ as indicated by the fabulous Allen Lewis illustration of Jorkens fending off a unicorn with his hunting rifle which adorns the dust jacket and also the illustrated title page.
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Price HK$ 4,600
Justine, Balthazar, Mountolive, Clea; Being the Alexandria Quartet. -
Lawrence Durrell
1957 - Faber and Faber, London - First Editions
A fine set in first issue dust jackets in superior condition.
'One of the most important works of our time.' - New York Times Book Review.
The Alexandria Quartet is Durrell’s most succesfull and admired work, at heart a sensuous and brilliant evocation of wartime Egypt.
In this world of corrupt glamour, L. G. Darley attempts to reconcile himself to the end of his affair with the dark, passionate Justine Hosnani - setting alight a beguiling exploration of sexual and political intrigue that Durrell himself described as 'an investigation of modern love'.
'A formidable, glittering achievement.' - Times Literary Supplement.
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Price HK$ 30,000
1957 - Faber and Faber, London - First Editions
A fine set in first issue dust jackets in superior condition.'One of the most important works of our time.' - New York Times Book Review.
The Alexandria Quartet is Durrell’s most succesfull and admired work, at heart a sensuous and brilliant evocation of wartime Egypt.
In this world of corrupt glamour, L. G. Darley attempts to reconcile himself to the end of his affair with the dark, passionate Justine Hosnani - setting alight a beguiling exploration of sexual and political intrigue that Durrell himself described as 'an investigation of modern love'.
'A formidable, glittering achievement.' - Times Literary Supplement.
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Price HK$ 30,000