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Our Man in Havana - An Entertainment -
Graham Greene
1958 - Heinemann, London Melbourne Toronto - First Edition
An exceptional example of the first edition of this ‘espionage thriller, a penetrating character study, and a political satire that still resonates today. Conceived as one of Graham Greene’s entertainments, it tells of MI6’s man in Havana, Wormold, a former vacuum-cleaner salesman turned reluctant secret agent out of economic necessity.
To keep his job, he files bogus reports based on Lamb’s Tales from Shakespeare and dreams up military installations from vacuum-cleaner designs. Then his stories start coming disturbingly true.’ - Penguin Classics Review.
- "I don't want any job. Why do you pick on me?
- "Patriotic Englishmen. Been here for years. Respected member of the European Trader's Association. We must have our man in Havana, you know. Submarines need fuel. Dictators drift together. Big ones draw in the little ones.
- "Atomic Submarines don't need fuel."
- "Quite right, old man, quite right..."
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Price HK$ 4,000
1958 - Heinemann, London Melbourne Toronto - First Edition
An exceptional example of the first edition of this ‘espionage thriller, a penetrating character study, and a political satire that still resonates today. Conceived as one of Graham Greene’s entertainments, it tells of MI6’s man in Havana, Wormold, a former vacuum-cleaner salesman turned reluctant secret agent out of economic necessity.To keep his job, he files bogus reports based on Lamb’s Tales from Shakespeare and dreams up military installations from vacuum-cleaner designs. Then his stories start coming disturbingly true.’ - Penguin Classics Review.
- "I don't want any job. Why do you pick on me?
- "Patriotic Englishmen. Been here for years. Respected member of the European Trader's Association. We must have our man in Havana, you know. Submarines need fuel. Dictators drift together. Big ones draw in the little ones.
- "Atomic Submarines don't need fuel."
- "Quite right, old man, quite right..."
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Price HK$ 4,000
The Hoods -
Harry Grey (Pseud. Herschel Goldberg)
1952 - Crown Publishers, New York - First Edition
A rare first edition in unfaded dust jacket. The first novel by Harry Grey (Herschel Goldberg) later to become Sergio Leone’s epic ‘Once Upon a Time in America’ (1984) starring Robert DeNiro loosely playing Harry's life as David ‘Noodles’ Aaronson.
A partly autobiographical account of Goldberg, a Ukrainian born Jewish gangster in New York's Lower East Side between 1910 and 1933, legend has it that this was written whilst incarcerated in the notorious Sing-Sing prison, using the pseudonym Harry Grey to protect his family.
Housed in a bespoke black clamshell case with red morocco spine label lettered in gilt.
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Price HK$ 17,000
1952 - Crown Publishers, New York - First Edition
A rare first edition in unfaded dust jacket. The first novel by Harry Grey (Herschel Goldberg) later to become Sergio Leone’s epic ‘Once Upon a Time in America’ (1984) starring Robert DeNiro loosely playing Harry's life as David ‘Noodles’ Aaronson.A partly autobiographical account of Goldberg, a Ukrainian born Jewish gangster in New York's Lower East Side between 1910 and 1933, legend has it that this was written whilst incarcerated in the notorious Sing-Sing prison, using the pseudonym Harry Grey to protect his family.
Housed in a bespoke black clamshell case with red morocco spine label lettered in gilt.
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Price HK$ 17,000
Darkey Ditties. Poems. -
Elliott B. Henderson
1915 - Self Published, Columbus - First Edition
Elliott Blaine Henderson’s ninth collection of African-American poetry.
Amongst the poems are such titles as ‘Cispus Attucks’, ‘De Bes’ State in de Lan’’, ‘A Plantation “Step-erbout”’, ‘Some Negro Characteristics’; ‘A Retrospection’, and ‘Sich an Itchin’ in Mah Shin’.
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Price HK$ 1,200
1915 - Self Published, Columbus - First Edition
Elliott Blaine Henderson’s ninth collection of African-American poetry.Amongst the poems are such titles as ‘Cispus Attucks’, ‘De Bes’ State in de Lan’’, ‘A Plantation “Step-erbout”’, ‘Some Negro Characteristics’; ‘A Retrospection’, and ‘Sich an Itchin’ in Mah Shin’.
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Price HK$ 1,200
Heart of the West -
O. Henry (Pseud. William Sydney Porter)
1907 - The McClure Company, New York - First Edition
First edition of this collection of 19 short western stories set mostly in Texas, by the American master of short stories with his characteristic twists and turns.
William Sydney Porter (pseud. O.Henry, 1862-1910) lived in Texas from the age of 19 to 35, including a stint working on a sheep ranch south of San Antonio.
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Price HK$ 2,500
1907 - The McClure Company, New York - First Edition
First edition of this collection of 19 short western stories set mostly in Texas, by the American master of short stories with his characteristic twists and turns.William Sydney Porter (pseud. O.Henry, 1862-1910) lived in Texas from the age of 19 to 35, including a stint working on a sheep ranch south of San Antonio.
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Price HK$ 2,500
The Northern Clemency - SIGNED -
Philip Hensher
2008 - Fourth Estate, London - First Edition
‘Hensher’s novel is tremendously adroit, reminding us of what it’s like to sink luxuriously into the great novels of an earlier era: all-inclusive, interconnected, and lavishly detailed…’ – The New York Times
Set between the quiet suburbs of Sheffield and the bustle of London, and spanning twenty years, Philip Hensher’s epic novel – which follows the lives of two not quite upper-middle-class families who first encounter one another living on the same Sheffield street overlooking the Yorkshire moors – revisits the dawn of Thatcher’s Britain of the 1970s, and traces the volatile confidence and despair of the 80s, all the way through to the awakening of a new Britain in the 1990s.
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Price HK$ 1,000
2008 - Fourth Estate, London - First Edition
‘Hensher’s novel is tremendously adroit, reminding us of what it’s like to sink luxuriously into the great novels of an earlier era: all-inclusive, interconnected, and lavishly detailed…’ – The New York TimesSet between the quiet suburbs of Sheffield and the bustle of London, and spanning twenty years, Philip Hensher’s epic novel – which follows the lives of two not quite upper-middle-class families who first encounter one another living on the same Sheffield street overlooking the Yorkshire moors – revisits the dawn of Thatcher’s Britain of the 1970s, and traces the volatile confidence and despair of the 80s, all the way through to the awakening of a new Britain in the 1990s.
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Price HK$ 1,000
The Outsiders -
Susan Eloise Hinton
1967 - The Viking Press, New York - First Edition
‘Stay gold, Ponyboy, stay gold.’
A superior example of the rare first edition of S.E. Hinton's first book, written while she was 16 and still in high school. Set in Oklahoma in the 1960s, the book was inspired by two rival gangs at her high school, the Greasers and the Socs; it was the basis for the 1983 cult film directed by Francis Ford Coppola which included a number of then unknown actors such as Matt Dillon, Patrick Swayze, Rob Lowe, Emilio Estevez, Tom Cruise, and Diane Lane.
The dust jacket without chips, tears, or fading to the spine where the colours are still bright red, as they should be.
‘The Outsiders transformed young-adult fiction from a genre mostly about prom queens, football players and high school crushes to one that portrayed a darker, truer world.’ – The New York Times.
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Price HK$ 28,000
1967 - The Viking Press, New York - First Edition
‘Stay gold, Ponyboy, stay gold.’A superior example of the rare first edition of S.E. Hinton's first book, written while she was 16 and still in high school. Set in Oklahoma in the 1960s, the book was inspired by two rival gangs at her high school, the Greasers and the Socs; it was the basis for the 1983 cult film directed by Francis Ford Coppola which included a number of then unknown actors such as Matt Dillon, Patrick Swayze, Rob Lowe, Emilio Estevez, Tom Cruise, and Diane Lane.
The dust jacket without chips, tears, or fading to the spine where the colours are still bright red, as they should be.
‘The Outsiders transformed young-adult fiction from a genre mostly about prom queens, football players and high school crushes to one that portrayed a darker, truer world.’ – The New York Times.
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Price HK$ 28,000
Lions and Shadows - An Education in the Twenties -
Christopher Isherwood
1938 - Leonard &, London - First Edition, First Impression
The first of Isherwood’s fictional biographies. A captivating account of a young novelist’s development in the literary culture of 1920s Cambridge and London and of his experiences as he forged lifelong friendships with his peers W. H. Auden, Stephen Spender, and Edward Upward.
‘That young man holds the future of the English novel in his hands.’ - W. Somerset Maugham, after reading Lions and Shadows.
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Price HK$ 4,000
1938 - Leonard &, London - First Edition, First Impression
The first of Isherwood’s fictional biographies. A captivating account of a young novelist’s development in the literary culture of 1920s Cambridge and London and of his experiences as he forged lifelong friendships with his peers W. H. Auden, Stephen Spender, and Edward Upward.‘That young man holds the future of the English novel in his hands.’ - W. Somerset Maugham, after reading Lions and Shadows.
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Price HK$ 4,000
Transition - A Complete Run - Numbers 1-27. -
Eugene Jolas (editor)
1927 to 1938 - Transition Press, Paris - First Editions
A rare complete set of the most influential and important literary magazine between the wars. Edited by Eugene Jolas, contributors are a whose who of writers, poets and artists of this magnificent period, including but not limited to James Joyce, Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, Georges Braque, Kay Boyle, Elliot Paul, Man Ray, Robert McAlmon, Rainer Maria Rilke, Pablo Picasso, André Breton, William Carlos Williams, Robert Graves, Hart Crane, André Gide, Joan Miro, Max Ernst, Malcolm Cowley, Djuna Barnes, Franz Kafka, Harry Crosby, Archibald MacLeish, Samuel Beckett, Piet Mondrian, Constantin Brancusi, Henri Matisse, Cartier-Bresson, Dylan Thomas, Louis Aragon, Le Corbusier and Aaron Copland.
Numbers 1-20 published between April 1927 and June 1930 by Transition with Shakespeare and Co., in Paris. Numbers 21-24 published between March 1932 and June 1936 by The Servire Press in The Hague. Volumes 25-27 published between fall 1936 and May 1938 by Transition in New York.
Included with the set is the Gertrude Stein’s ‘An Elucidation, printed in Transition, April 1927’ in original wrappers, and ‘Transition Pamphlet No 1’ (supplement to Transition no 23, 1934-35) containing the ‘Testimony against Gertrude Stein’.
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Price HK$ 45,000
1927 to 1938 - Transition Press, Paris - First Editions
A rare complete set of the most influential and important literary magazine between the wars. Edited by Eugene Jolas, contributors are a whose who of writers, poets and artists of this magnificent period, including but not limited to James Joyce, Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, Georges Braque, Kay Boyle, Elliot Paul, Man Ray, Robert McAlmon, Rainer Maria Rilke, Pablo Picasso, André Breton, William Carlos Williams, Robert Graves, Hart Crane, André Gide, Joan Miro, Max Ernst, Malcolm Cowley, Djuna Barnes, Franz Kafka, Harry Crosby, Archibald MacLeish, Samuel Beckett, Piet Mondrian, Constantin Brancusi, Henri Matisse, Cartier-Bresson, Dylan Thomas, Louis Aragon, Le Corbusier and Aaron Copland.Numbers 1-20 published between April 1927 and June 1930 by Transition with Shakespeare and Co., in Paris. Numbers 21-24 published between March 1932 and June 1936 by The Servire Press in The Hague. Volumes 25-27 published between fall 1936 and May 1938 by Transition in New York.
Included with the set is the Gertrude Stein’s ‘An Elucidation, printed in Transition, April 1927’ in original wrappers, and ‘Transition Pamphlet No 1’ (supplement to Transition no 23, 1934-35) containing the ‘Testimony against Gertrude Stein’.
More details
Price HK$ 45,000