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The Centenary Edition of Ian Fleming's James Bond Novels - Ian Lancaster Fleming

2008 - Penguin 007, London - Centenary Edition, First Printings
A complete 14 volume collection of the Bond novels, issued to celebrate the 100th birthday of Ian Fleming (28th May 2008).

With the magnificently ‘retro’ style artwork by Michael Gillette to dust jackets.

A fine and particularly uncommon set, all first printings in first printing dust jackets, housed in a custom-made cloth slipcase with fleece lining and ribbon pulls, each dust jacket with archival cover.
 
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Price HK$ 25,000



The Works of Rudyard Kipling - Signed - Rudyard Kipling

1914-1926 - Doubleday, Garden City - Seven Seas Edition. Number 487 of 1050 limited copies. (The counterpart to the London Bombay Edition)
A handsomely bound complete set of Kipling’s works in twenty-seven volumes, the de luxe issue limited to 1,050 sets, the first volume, Plain Tales from the Hills, is signed by Kipling.

Printed at the Country Life Press, Gardem City, Long Island from Florentine Press type on special hand-made paper with watermark bearing “R [Ganesha device with lotus and swastika] K” on each second leaf.

Including such titles as
Soldiers Three, Kim, The Jungle Book, Captains Courageous, Stalky & Co., Just So Stories, The Five Nations, Plain Tales from the Hills and the Seven Seas 
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Price HK$ 45,000



The Karla Trilogy Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy; The Honourable Schoolboy; Smiley s People - Signed - John le Carr

1974 - Hodder and Stoughton, London - First Editions
A signed first edition set of John le Carré’s acclaimed espionage trilogy – Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, The Honourable Schoolboy and Smiley’s People – featuring legendary master spy George Smiley pitted against his elusive Cold War rival, Karla.

In addition to Le Carré signing each book to the title page,
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy includes a signed photograph of Sir Alec Guinness who played the part of Smiley in the original BBC adaptation, considered ‘one of the greatest performances ever seen on the small screen’ by the Guardian newspaper in 2019. The Honourable Schoolboy, includes a card with a typed quote signed by Le Carré.

First edition, first issue of
The Honourable Schoolboy with maps of Hong Kong for endpapers, these where not included in the second issue.

As a secret service agent, Le Carré moved from MI5 to MI6, and was in Berlin when the wall was erected. His experiences inspired him to write a novel which became '
Call For The Dead'; 'When I first began writing, Ian Fleming was riding high and the picture of the spy was that of a character who could have affairs with women, drive a fast car, who used gadgetry and gimmickry to escape.' Le Carré’s aim was to portray the intelligence world from a new view and he has earned a reputation for gritty, realistic, suspenseful spy novels based on a wide knowledge of international espionage or simply human behaviour. His famous recurring character, George Smiley, is an ageing, diffident, shadow-like member of the British foreign service, and the antithesis of James Bond; this trilogy of Smiley books is the author's masterwork, a thrilling elegy for post-imperial Britain. 'Tinker Tailor...' was the basis for the Oscar-nominated 2011 film starring Gary Oldman.

‘Simply the world’s greatest fictional spymaster’
– Newsweek. 
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Price HK$ 50,000



1953-1955 - Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick
A handsomely bound nine volume set of the most comprehensive collection to date of Abraham Lincoln’s speeches, letters and notes, together with a one volume index. A massive undertaking by the Abraham Lincoln Association of Springfield, Illinois.

Illustrated with photographs and plates reproducing documents, and engraved portrait frontispiece to volume I
 
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Price HK$ 24,000



Burgundiae [Burgundy] Comitatus Recentiss. Descriptio D - Abraham Ortelius

1585Antwerpen
A handsome early and large map of Burgundy by the great engraver ad cartographer Abraham Ortelius [map size 36.5 x 50.5 cm], based on the 1563 map of Ferdinand de Lannoy that was suppressed by the Spaniards for political reasons. With place names mainly in French, some in Latin, titles and scale in Latin.

With contemporary hand colouring, and embellished with elaborate strapwork title cartouche and coat of arms. Showing rivers, mountains, forests, fortifications, towns and cities. From Ortelius’ ‘
Theatrum Orbis Terrarum’.

The orientation is from
Oriens or East (top) to Occidens or West (bottom), Septemtrio (the seven stars of Ursa Major) or North (left) to Meridies or South (right).

Finely framed in gilt wood, acid free boarder and backing, and Tru-Vue 98% UV glass [frame size 57 x 71 cm].
 
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Price HK$ 15,000



Life and Writings of Thomas Paine - Thomas Paine, Daniel Edwin Wheeler (editor)

1908 - Vincent Parke and Company, New York - Independence Edition of the Centenary Issue
These are the times that try men's souls

Elegantly bound ten volume set of the de luxe independence edition, number 166 of just 500 hand-numbered sets signed by the editor Daniel Edwin Wheeler, published to celebrate the centenary of Paine's death.

Included are Paine’s ‘
Common Sense’, ‘The American Crises’, ‘The Rights of Man’, and ‘The Age of Reason’, as well as essays, letters and speeches. Each volume with three photogravure or facsimile plates, as well as a frontispiece, title-pages printed in two colours, autographed limitation leaf to volume one.

‘On January 10, 1776, an obscure immigrant published a small pamphlet that ignited independence in America and shifted the political landscape of the patriot movement from reform within the British imperial system to independence from it. One hundred twenty thousand copies sold in the first three months in a nation of three million people, making
Common Sense the best-selling printed work by a single author in American history up to that time. Never before had a personally written work appealed to all classes of colonists. Never before had a pamphlet been written in an inspiring style so accessible to the “common” folk of America.’ - Jack Miller Center. 
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Price HK$ 35,000



Backgammon: Its History and Practice - George Frederick Pardon, Kenny Meadows (illustrator)

1844 - D. Bogue, London - First Edition
A rare and superior first edition of this wonderfully illustrated little work on Backgammon. Surprisingly for a game that may have originated around 2,500 BC this is one of the earliest English treatise to focus on the game.

Quite comprehensive, the cheeky ‘
Punch’ style vignettes enhancing the more humorous anecdotes and quotes. The final chapter ‘Definition of Technicalities’ is not as dull as it sounds, for example -

“Covering your man to make sure of him” – A procedure to prevent your man being hit in the game – to ensure it in a duel.

“Gammon.” – A thing that abounds in many huge, old, smoky chimneys in the country, and in many well-ventilated public apartments in town’.

“High Doublets” – Twinned sixes or cinqs – frequent and highly ridiculous in operas, when melodious ladies enact truculent warriors.’
 
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Price HK$ 8,000



Sandow on Physical Training - Eugen Sandow

1894 - Gale &, London - First Edition
A scarce and remarkably clean copy of the rare first edition in it’s original pictorial covers, by the ‘Father of Bodybuilding’, who still sits atop the Mr Olympia trophy. ‘Sandow The Magnificent’ also opened one of the first ‘health clubs’ in the world. He was friends with Conan-Doyle, Thomas Edison and King George V. A large volume richly illustrated from photographs, drawings and diagrams.

Sandow's resemblance to the physiques found on classical Greek and Roman sculpture was no accident, as he measured the statues in museums and helped to develop "The Grecian Ideal" as a formula for the "perfect physique." He is seen as one of the first athletes to intentionally develop his musculature to predetermined dimensions. In
Strength and How to Obtain It Sandow lays out specific prescriptions of weights and repetitions in order to achieve his ideal proportion.

Sandow was the promoter and judge at the first bodybuilding contest ever held, at the Royal Albert Hall in London on September 14, 1901, and his importance was such that the trophy for Mr. Olympia is a statuette of Sandow, one could even say that Sandow was the inspiration for a later Governor of California.
 
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Price HK$ 9,000



 
Results 25 - 32 of 43 results