Literature
Crime & Detective
Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Spies Espionage James Bond 007
Austen Bronte
Conrad & Kipling
Dickens & Shakespeare
Greene & Orwell
Hemingway & Steinbeck
Maugham & Waugh
Wodehouse
Antiquarian
Modern
American
Poetry
The Man Who Turned Into a Stick. Three Related Plays – SIGNED -
K b Abe
1975 - University of Tokyo Press, Tokyo - First Edition in English
Inscribed by Kōbō Abe in Japanese and signed in English. Translated by Donald Keene.
This work contains three plays written between 1957 and 1969, usually presented together and symbolising the different stages of life. The first, representing birth, is The Suitcase. The second, The Cliff of Time, represents life itself, or The Process and the third, The Man who Turned into a Stick, is death.
The Man Who Turned Into A Stick (棒になった男 – Bō ni natta otoko), is considered a primary example of magic realism in Japanese literature.
More details
Price HK$ 6,000
1975 - University of Tokyo Press, Tokyo - First Edition in English
Inscribed by Kōbō Abe in Japanese and signed in English. Translated by Donald Keene.This work contains three plays written between 1957 and 1969, usually presented together and symbolising the different stages of life. The first, representing birth, is The Suitcase. The second, The Cliff of Time, represents life itself, or The Process and the third, The Man who Turned into a Stick, is death.
The Man Who Turned Into A Stick (棒になった男 – Bō ni natta otoko), is considered a primary example of magic realism in Japanese literature.
More details
Price HK$ 6,000
The Man With the Golden Arm -
Nelson Algren
1949 - Doubleday & Company, New York - First Edition
‘There’s people in hell who want ice water…’
Algren’s shockingly brilliant novel of the disinherited, The Man With the Golden Arm tells the sordid tale of Frankie Machine, the ‘golden arm’ dealer of a back street Chicago gambling den, whose heroin addiction and failing marriage drive him to the depths of despair.
The character of Frankie Machine was memorably brought to life on the silver screen by Frank Sinatra, in Otto Preminger’s 1955 film adaption of the novel, which co-starred Kim Novak and Eleanor Parker.
More details
Price HK$ 2,600
1949 - Doubleday & Company, New York - First Edition
‘There’s people in hell who want ice water…’Algren’s shockingly brilliant novel of the disinherited, The Man With the Golden Arm tells the sordid tale of Frankie Machine, the ‘golden arm’ dealer of a back street Chicago gambling den, whose heroin addiction and failing marriage drive him to the depths of despair.
The character of Frankie Machine was memorably brought to life on the silver screen by Frank Sinatra, in Otto Preminger’s 1955 film adaption of the novel, which co-starred Kim Novak and Eleanor Parker.
More details
Price HK$ 2,600
An African Millionaire -
Grant Allen
1897 - Grant Richards, London - First Edition
A bright sharp copy of what is considered to be the first work to feature a criminal protagonist, and the first great gentleman rogue of mystery fiction - Colonel Clay.
‘Wealthy, confident and handsome, Charles Van Drift is not accustomed to being swindled and his brush with Colonel Clay both rattles and infuriates him. As his South African diamond fortune takes hit after hit from the quick-witted master of disguise, Allen leaves even the reader guessing: who can you trust? Van Drift grows more suspicious of those around him and a few too many misguided accusations shake the millionaire's confidence. Colonel Clay is in his head.’
More details
Price HK$ 3,500
1897 - Grant Richards, London - First Edition
A bright sharp copy of what is considered to be the first work to feature a criminal protagonist, and the first great gentleman rogue of mystery fiction - Colonel Clay.‘Wealthy, confident and handsome, Charles Van Drift is not accustomed to being swindled and his brush with Colonel Clay both rattles and infuriates him. As his South African diamond fortune takes hit after hit from the quick-witted master of disguise, Allen leaves even the reader guessing: who can you trust? Van Drift grows more suspicious of those around him and a few too many misguided accusations shake the millionaire's confidence. Colonel Clay is in his head.’
More details
Price HK$ 3,500
Journey into Fear -
Eric Ambler
1940 - Hodder and Stoughton Limited, London - First Edition
A clean and wonderfully bright, thus rare, jacketed first edition of this thrilling tale of international intrigue, beginning in Istanbul at the outbreak of World War II.
‘Returning to his hotel room after a late-night flirtation with a cabaret dancer at an Istanbul boîte, Graham is surprised by an intruder with a gun. What follows is a nightmare of intrigue for the English armaments engineer as he makes his way home aboard an Italian freighter. Among the passengers are a couple of Nazi assassins intent on preventing his returning to England with plans for a Turkish defence system, the seductive cabaret dancer and her manager husband, and a number of surprising allies.’ [from a later edition]
More details
Price HK$ 14,000
1940 - Hodder and Stoughton Limited, London - First Edition
A clean and wonderfully bright, thus rare, jacketed first edition of this thrilling tale of international intrigue, beginning in Istanbul at the outbreak of World War II.‘Returning to his hotel room after a late-night flirtation with a cabaret dancer at an Istanbul boîte, Graham is surprised by an intruder with a gun. What follows is a nightmare of intrigue for the English armaments engineer as he makes his way home aboard an Italian freighter. Among the passengers are a couple of Nazi assassins intent on preventing his returning to England with plans for a Turkish defence system, the seductive cabaret dancer and her manager husband, and a number of surprising allies.’ [from a later edition]
More details
Price HK$ 14,000
The Night-Comers -
Eric Ambler
1956 - William Heinemann Ltd, London - First Edition
A fine first edition of this thriller set in Southeast Asia. 'The Night-Comers' covers 24 critical hours in a military coup d'etat. Published in America as 'State of Siege'. Filmed by Rank in 1959.
Written by Ambler on his return from travelling through Southeast Asia.
Batik style patterned dust jacket designed by Judith Bledsoe.
More details
Price HK$ 1,100
1956 - William Heinemann Ltd, London - First Edition
A fine first edition of this thriller set in Southeast Asia. 'The Night-Comers' covers 24 critical hours in a military coup d'etat. Published in America as 'State of Siege'. Filmed by Rank in 1959.Written by Ambler on his return from travelling through Southeast Asia.
Batik style patterned dust jacket designed by Judith Bledsoe.
More details
Price HK$ 1,100
Cause For Alarm -
Eric Ambler
1940 - Alfred A. Knopf, New York - Second Printing
A classic Ambler spy thriller.
‘It seemed to me that the train had started to make a curious thumping noise. I tried to separate the noise, identify it, and realised that it was the sound of the blood pumping in my head. I knew suddenly that I was scared, scared stiff’
‘Nicky Marlow needs a job. He's engaged to be married and the employment market in Britain in 1937 is pretty slim. So when his fiancée points out the position with an English armaments manufacturer in Italy, he jumps at the chance. Soon after he arrives, however, he learns the sinister truth about his predecessor's departure and finds himself courted by two agents with dangerously different agendas. In the process, Marlow realizes that it's not so simple just to do the job he's paid for - not in fascist Italy, on the eve of a world war’ [Penguin Classics]
More details
Price HK$ 2,000
1940 - Alfred A. Knopf, New York - Second Printing
A classic Ambler spy thriller.‘It seemed to me that the train had started to make a curious thumping noise. I tried to separate the noise, identify it, and realised that it was the sound of the blood pumping in my head. I knew suddenly that I was scared, scared stiff’
‘Nicky Marlow needs a job. He's engaged to be married and the employment market in Britain in 1937 is pretty slim. So when his fiancée points out the position with an English armaments manufacturer in Italy, he jumps at the chance. Soon after he arrives, however, he learns the sinister truth about his predecessor's departure and finds himself courted by two agents with dangerously different agendas. In the process, Marlow realizes that it's not so simple just to do the job he's paid for - not in fascist Italy, on the eve of a world war’ [Penguin Classics]
More details
Price HK$ 2,000
Le Paysan de Paris – The Peasant of Paris -
Louis Aragon, Henri Cartier-Bresson
1994 - The Limited editions Club, New York - Number 89 of 300 copies.
‘I was seeking… a new kind of novel that would break all the traditional rules governing the writing of fiction… a novel that the critics would be obliged to approach empty-handed’ – Louis Aragon.
A large (32x42cm) beautiful and superbly produced limited edition folio of Louis Aragon’s outstanding Surrealist novel – in which he compares a poet’s love for his city to a peasant’s love for his land – illustrated and signed by Henri Cartier-Bresson on the limitation page. Translated into English by Simon Watson-Taylor.
Stunningly illustrated with seven original lithographs and a photogravure by Henri Cartier-Bresson. The lithographs were pulled by Bruce Porter at his Trestle Editions studio in New York. The photogravure was printed by Jon Goodman on French-made Arjo Wiggins stock.
Bound in silk and provided with a matching felt lined silk slipcase.
First published in 1926, ‘Le Paysan de Paris’ is today considered one of the central Surrealist texts and a work that helps define the movement itself. Avoiding any recognisable characterisation or form, Aragon’s narrative is both unconventional and lyrical – in his own words, ‘a mythology of the modern’. Using the city of Paris as a framework, Aragon interlaces the text with the city’s ephemera: café menus, maps, inscriptions on monuments, and newspaper clippings, together with the lives of its citizens. His detailed descriptions of a Parisian passage, the nineteenth-century precursor to the mini-mall, and of the Buttes-Chaumont park, are the great set pieces within Aragon’s swirling philosophical, dreamlike, and satirical prose.
More details
Price HK$ 9,000
1994 - The Limited editions Club, New York - Number 89 of 300 copies.
‘I was seeking… a new kind of novel that would break all the traditional rules governing the writing of fiction… a novel that the critics would be obliged to approach empty-handed’ – Louis Aragon.A large (32x42cm) beautiful and superbly produced limited edition folio of Louis Aragon’s outstanding Surrealist novel – in which he compares a poet’s love for his city to a peasant’s love for his land – illustrated and signed by Henri Cartier-Bresson on the limitation page. Translated into English by Simon Watson-Taylor.
Stunningly illustrated with seven original lithographs and a photogravure by Henri Cartier-Bresson. The lithographs were pulled by Bruce Porter at his Trestle Editions studio in New York. The photogravure was printed by Jon Goodman on French-made Arjo Wiggins stock.
Bound in silk and provided with a matching felt lined silk slipcase.
First published in 1926, ‘Le Paysan de Paris’ is today considered one of the central Surrealist texts and a work that helps define the movement itself. Avoiding any recognisable characterisation or form, Aragon’s narrative is both unconventional and lyrical – in his own words, ‘a mythology of the modern’. Using the city of Paris as a framework, Aragon interlaces the text with the city’s ephemera: café menus, maps, inscriptions on monuments, and newspaper clippings, together with the lives of its citizens. His detailed descriptions of a Parisian passage, the nineteenth-century precursor to the mini-mall, and of the Buttes-Chaumont park, are the great set pieces within Aragon’s swirling philosophical, dreamlike, and satirical prose.
More details
Price HK$ 9,000
The Splendid Idle Forties. Stories of Old California -
Gertrude Atherton, Harrison Fisher (illustrator)
1902 - The Macmillan Company, New York - First Edition
‘Perhaps the best known collection of stories of that romantic period of California history when the incoming Americans were first intermingling with the Californians of rancho and presidio...’ – The Zamorano 80: A Selection of Distinguished California Books Made by Members of the Zamorano Club.
A fine bright example, of this collection of short stories, illustrated with eight plates by Harrison Fisher.
‘The finest stories ever written about early California’ – Phil Townsend Hanna.
The stories are: The Pearls of Loreto; The Ears of Twenty Americans; The Washtub Mail; The Conquest of Dona Jacoba; A Ramble with Eulogia; The Isle of Skulls; The Head of a Priest; La Perdida; Lukari's Story; Natalie Ivanhoff: A Memory of Fort Ross; The Vengeance of Padre Arroyo; The Bells of San Gabriel; and When the Devil was Well.
More details
Price HK$ 3,500
1902 - The Macmillan Company, New York - First Edition
‘Perhaps the best known collection of stories of that romantic period of California history when the incoming Americans were first intermingling with the Californians of rancho and presidio...’ – The Zamorano 80: A Selection of Distinguished California Books Made by Members of the Zamorano Club.A fine bright example, of this collection of short stories, illustrated with eight plates by Harrison Fisher.
‘The finest stories ever written about early California’ – Phil Townsend Hanna.
The stories are: The Pearls of Loreto; The Ears of Twenty Americans; The Washtub Mail; The Conquest of Dona Jacoba; A Ramble with Eulogia; The Isle of Skulls; The Head of a Priest; La Perdida; Lukari's Story; Natalie Ivanhoff: A Memory of Fort Ross; The Vengeance of Padre Arroyo; The Bells of San Gabriel; and When the Devil was Well.
More details
Price HK$ 3,500