The Adventures and The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes -
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
1892 - George Newnes, London - First Editions
A finely bound set of first editions of the first two short story collections, up to the Reichenbach Falls episode of The Final Problem.
Magnificently illustrated throughout from wood engravings by Sidney Paget.
The Adventures containing twelve stories including A Scandal in Bohemia, introducing Irene Adler and The Speckled Band.
The Memoirs containing eleven stories including The Final Problem, and “Silver Blaze”.
These legendary Sherlock Holmes stories all initially appeared in The Strand Magazine, the year before.
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Price HK$ 45,000
1892 - George Newnes, London - First Editions
A finely bound set of first editions of the first two short story collections, up to the Reichenbach Falls episode of The Final Problem. Magnificently illustrated throughout from wood engravings by Sidney Paget.
The Adventures containing twelve stories including A Scandal in Bohemia, introducing Irene Adler and The Speckled Band.
The Memoirs containing eleven stories including The Final Problem, and “Silver Blaze”.
These legendary Sherlock Holmes stories all initially appeared in The Strand Magazine, the year before.
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Price HK$ 45,000
The Four Quartets: Burnt Norton; East Coker; The Dry Salvages; Little Gidding -
T.S. Eliot
1941 - Faber and Faber, London - First Editions
Four first editions of what Eliot himself considered to be his finest work finely bound into one volume, housed in a matching custom slipcase.
‘Four Quartets’ is a rich composition that expands the spiritual vision introduced in ’The Waste Land’. First published individually from 1936 to 1942. Here, in four linked poems (’Burnt Norton’, ‘East Coker’, ‘The Dry Salvages’, and ‘Little Gidding’), spiritual, philosophical, and personal themes emerge through symbolic allusions and literary and religious references from both Eastern and Western thought. It is the culminating achievement by a man many feel to be the greatest poet of the twentieth century and one of the seminal figures in the evolution of modernism.
‘Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.’ – Burnt Norton
‘In my beginning is my end.’ – East Coker
‘I do not know much about gods; but I think that the river
Is a strong brown gold – sullen, untamed and intractable...’ – Dry Salvages
‘Midwinter spring is its own season
Sempiternal though sodden towards sundown,
Suspended in time, between pole and tropic.’ – Little Gidding
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Price HK$ 8,000
1941 - Faber and Faber, London - First Editions
Four first editions of what Eliot himself considered to be his finest work finely bound into one volume, housed in a matching custom slipcase.‘Four Quartets’ is a rich composition that expands the spiritual vision introduced in ’The Waste Land’. First published individually from 1936 to 1942. Here, in four linked poems (’Burnt Norton’, ‘East Coker’, ‘The Dry Salvages’, and ‘Little Gidding’), spiritual, philosophical, and personal themes emerge through symbolic allusions and literary and religious references from both Eastern and Western thought. It is the culminating achievement by a man many feel to be the greatest poet of the twentieth century and one of the seminal figures in the evolution of modernism.
‘Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future,
And time future contained in time past.’ – Burnt Norton
‘In my beginning is my end.’ – East Coker
‘I do not know much about gods; but I think that the river
Is a strong brown gold – sullen, untamed and intractable...’ – Dry Salvages
‘Midwinter spring is its own season
Sempiternal though sodden towards sundown,
Suspended in time, between pole and tropic.’ – Little Gidding
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Price HK$ 8,000
The Great Gatsby -
F. Scott Fitzgerald
1925 - Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York - First Edition, First Issue
‘So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.’
An elegantly bound first edition of this landmark of 20th century fiction, and the epitome of the Jazz Age in American literature, which incredibly, sold very little during Fitzgerald’s lifetime.
‘I believe that on the first night I went to Gatsby’s house I was one of the few guests who had actually been invited. People were not invited – they went there.’
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Price HK$ 38,000
1925 - Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York - First Edition, First Issue
‘So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.’An elegantly bound first edition of this landmark of 20th century fiction, and the epitome of the Jazz Age in American literature, which incredibly, sold very little during Fitzgerald’s lifetime.
‘I believe that on the first night I went to Gatsby’s house I was one of the few guests who had actually been invited. People were not invited – they went there.’
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Price HK$ 38,000
Complete James Bond series -
Ian Lancaster Fleming
1963-1979 - Jonathan Cape, London - Early Editions
A magnificent and complete 14 volume set of the Jonathan Cape printings (the original publisher of the James Bond novels), the final title Octopussy being a first impression, as this book was never reprinted in the original format.
Each book is in publisher’s cloth, with the creative embellishments in gilt silver or gilt matching those of the first editions. All dust jacket designs match those of the first Cape Editions with the exception of Casino Royale which was changed, after the third impression, to the wonderful ‘Vesper Lynd’ playing card style shown here, and Moonraker is in the 1965 design.
Comprising: Casino Royale, Live and Let Die, Moonraker, Diamonds Are Forever, From Russia With Love, Dr. No, Goldfinger, For Your Eyes Only (short stories inc. From A View To A Kill and Quantum of Solace), Thunderball, The Spy Who loved Me, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, You Only Live Twice, The Man with the Golden Gun and Octopussy and The Living Daylights (short stories).
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Price HK$ 25,000
1963-1979 - Jonathan Cape, London - Early Editions
A magnificent and complete 14 volume set of the Jonathan Cape printings (the original publisher of the James Bond novels), the final title Octopussy being a first impression, as this book was never reprinted in the original format.Each book is in publisher’s cloth, with the creative embellishments in gilt silver or gilt matching those of the first editions. All dust jacket designs match those of the first Cape Editions with the exception of Casino Royale which was changed, after the third impression, to the wonderful ‘Vesper Lynd’ playing card style shown here, and Moonraker is in the 1965 design.
Comprising: Casino Royale, Live and Let Die, Moonraker, Diamonds Are Forever, From Russia With Love, Dr. No, Goldfinger, For Your Eyes Only (short stories inc. From A View To A Kill and Quantum of Solace), Thunderball, The Spy Who loved Me, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, You Only Live Twice, The Man with the Golden Gun and Octopussy and The Living Daylights (short stories).
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Price HK$ 25,000
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
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
Flying Colours. Including A Ship Of The Line -
C. S. Forester
1938 - Michael Joseph Ltd. in conjunction with The Book Society Ltd., London - First Edition
One finely bound volume containing two classic Hornblower novels, in which Captain Horatio Hornblower commands his first ship of the line, HMS Sutherland. A Ship Of The Line and Flying Colours, are the second and third books in the Horatio Hornblower series. This is the first publication of Flying Colours which was released shortly afterwards as a stand alone title, making this the true first edition.
A Ship of the Line - May 1810, seventeen years deep into the Napoleonic Wars. Captain Horatio Hornblower is newly in command of his first ship of the line, the seventy-four-gun HMS Sutherland, which he deems ‘the ugliest and least desirable two-decker in the Navy List’. Moreover, she is 250 men short of a full crew, so Hornblower must enlist and train ‘poachers, bigamists, sheepstealers’, and other landlubbers. By the time the Sutherland reaches the blockaded Catalonian coast of Spain, the crew is capable of staging five astonishing solo raids against the French. But the grisly prospect of defeat and capture looms for both captain and crew as the Sutherland single-handedly takes on four French ships.
Flying Colours - Forced to surrender the Sutherland after a long and bloody battle, Captain Horatio Hornblower now bides his time as a prisoner in a French fortress. Within days he and his first lieutenant, Bush, who was crippled in the last fight, are to be taken to Paris to be tried on trumped-up charges of violating the laws of war, and most probably executed as part of Napoleon's attempt to rally the war-weary empire behind him. Even if Hornblower escapes this fate and somehow finds his way back to England, he will face court-martial for his surrender of a British ship. As fears for his life and his reputation compete in his mind with worries about his pregnant wife and his possibly widowed lover, the indomitable captain impatiently awaits the chance to make his next move.
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Price HK$ 5,000
1938 - Michael Joseph Ltd. in conjunction with The Book Society Ltd., London - First Edition
One finely bound volume containing two classic Hornblower novels, in which Captain Horatio Hornblower commands his first ship of the line, HMS Sutherland. A Ship Of The Line and Flying Colours, are the second and third books in the Horatio Hornblower series. This is the first publication of Flying Colours which was released shortly afterwards as a stand alone title, making this the true first edition.A Ship of the Line - May 1810, seventeen years deep into the Napoleonic Wars. Captain Horatio Hornblower is newly in command of his first ship of the line, the seventy-four-gun HMS Sutherland, which he deems ‘the ugliest and least desirable two-decker in the Navy List’. Moreover, she is 250 men short of a full crew, so Hornblower must enlist and train ‘poachers, bigamists, sheepstealers’, and other landlubbers. By the time the Sutherland reaches the blockaded Catalonian coast of Spain, the crew is capable of staging five astonishing solo raids against the French. But the grisly prospect of defeat and capture looms for both captain and crew as the Sutherland single-handedly takes on four French ships.
Flying Colours - Forced to surrender the Sutherland after a long and bloody battle, Captain Horatio Hornblower now bides his time as a prisoner in a French fortress. Within days he and his first lieutenant, Bush, who was crippled in the last fight, are to be taken to Paris to be tried on trumped-up charges of violating the laws of war, and most probably executed as part of Napoleon's attempt to rally the war-weary empire behind him. Even if Hornblower escapes this fate and somehow finds his way back to England, he will face court-martial for his surrender of a British ship. As fears for his life and his reputation compete in his mind with worries about his pregnant wife and his possibly widowed lover, the indomitable captain impatiently awaits the chance to make his next move.
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Price HK$ 5,000
An Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard -
Thomas Gray
1869 - Sampson Low, London
‘Full many a Gem of purest Ray serene
The dark unfathom'd Caves of Ocean Bear:
Full many a Flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its Sweetness on the desert Air.’
A finely bound and illustrated edition of Thomas Gray’s ‘Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard’, one of the most widely-quoted poems of the 18th century. It is a meditation on the inevitability of death; the vanity of ambition and the universal human desire to be loved. In particular the poem looks at death as a leveller, an indiscriminate force which makes no distinction between the famous on the one hand and, on the other, the anonymous – those who, in the words of the poem:
Far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife
Their sober wishes never learn’d to stray
‘Widely considered his masterpiece, it is believed that Gray wrote the 'Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard' in the graveyard of the church in Stoke Poges, Buckinghamshire in 1751. The poem was a literary sensation when published by Robert Dodsley in February 1751 and has made a lasting contribution to English literature’
With sixteen colour chromolithograph illustrations from drawings by R. Barnes, R. P. Leitch, E. M. Wimperis and others, each with descriptive tissue guards, and two leaves of the original manuscript inn facsimile.
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Price HK$ 9,000
1869 - Sampson Low, London
‘Full many a Gem of purest Ray sereneThe dark unfathom'd Caves of Ocean Bear:
Full many a Flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its Sweetness on the desert Air.’
A finely bound and illustrated edition of Thomas Gray’s ‘Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard’, one of the most widely-quoted poems of the 18th century. It is a meditation on the inevitability of death; the vanity of ambition and the universal human desire to be loved. In particular the poem looks at death as a leveller, an indiscriminate force which makes no distinction between the famous on the one hand and, on the other, the anonymous – those who, in the words of the poem:
Far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife
Their sober wishes never learn’d to stray
‘Widely considered his masterpiece, it is believed that Gray wrote the 'Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard' in the graveyard of the church in Stoke Poges, Buckinghamshire in 1751. The poem was a literary sensation when published by Robert Dodsley in February 1751 and has made a lasting contribution to English literature’
With sixteen colour chromolithograph illustrations from drawings by R. Barnes, R. P. Leitch, E. M. Wimperis and others, each with descriptive tissue guards, and two leaves of the original manuscript inn facsimile.
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Price HK$ 9,000
Les Livres de L'Enfance du XVe au XIXe Siecle. Preface de Paul Gavault -
Gumuchian
1930 - Gumuchian & Compagnie, Paris - The first deluxe edition, limited to 100 copies on Papier de Hollande, this being number 10
Possibly the most important catalogue of children's books ever Issued. Two large quarto volumes, text in French and English, illustrated with 336 colour and black and white plates.
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Price HK$ 6,000
1930 - Gumuchian & Compagnie, Paris - The first deluxe edition, limited to 100 copies on Papier de Hollande, this being number 10
Possibly the most important catalogue of children's books ever Issued. Two large quarto volumes, text in French and English, illustrated with 336 colour and black and white plates.
More details
Price HK$ 6,000