Search Results: Titles starting with S from Honey & Wax Booksellers

London: C.F. Kell for Leonard Smithers, 1896. Original advertising "posterette" featuring Aubrey Beardsley's final cover design for The Savoy. A lavish quarterly devoted to literature, art, and criticism (mostly of Victorian behaviors), The Savoy was founded in 1896 by the libertine book dealer and publisher Leonard Smithers. Known for his decadent illustrations for Salomé and The Yellow Book, Beardsley was an inspired choice as designer. Due to a combination of societal backlash and a bloated budget, The Savoy ceased publication after only eight issues. This image appeared on the cover of the final single issue. It was reprinted shortly thereafter on this advertising "posterette" (as Beardsley termed it) to promote the complete three-volume set of The Savoy. An iconic image of the period. Color-lithographed poster, sight size 10.5 x 8.25 inches, framed to 18 x 15 inches. Signed with A/B monogram in lower left corner of image. A few faint creases.

Edinburgh and London: Blackwood, 1858. First edition of George Eliot's first published work of fiction, three related stories of love and loss in an English village: "The Sad Fortunes of the Rev. Amos Barton," "Mr. Gilfil's Love-Story," and "Janet's Repentance." The stories first appeared anonymously in Blackwood's Magazine in 1857, and were published together the following year as the work of "George Eliot," the first use of that pen name by Mary Ann Evans. Upon the book's appearance, Charles Dickens wrote Blackwood to congratulate the unknown author and to predict, correctly, that George Eliot would eventually be revealed as a woman. These early stories sound the depths of feeling experienced by everyday people, foreshadowing Eliot's major achievement in Middlemarch: "At least eighty out of a hundred of your adult male fellow-Britons returned in the last census are neither extraordinarily silly, nor extraordinarily wicked, nor extraordinarily wise; their eyes are neither deep and liquid with… Read More

New York: New World Records, 1977. Pop artist Robert Indiana's vivid serigraph poster for the 1977 New World Records release of The Mother of Us All, Virgil Thomson's 1947 opera about Susan B. Anthony, with a libretto by Gertrude Stein: "The right to sleep is given to no woman." Indiana had long been an active admirer of The Mother of Us All, designing sets for several stage productions, including the Santa Fe Opera's 1976 bicentennial production, whose recording is advertised here. The typography features Indiana's signature tipped O in MOTHER, a design element that recalls his iconic LOVE sculpture and stamp. For more on Indiana and The Mother of Us All, see David Littlejohn, "Artists on the Opera Stage" in The Ultimate Art (1992). A really attractive promotional poster, whose minor flaws would be mitigated by proper framing. Promotional poster, measuring 36 x 24 inches, screenprinted in red, yellow, black, white, and purple. Three corners creased, several short closed tears to bottom edge.

France: no publisher, no date (early twentieth century). Striking hand-colored sheet of six "images d'Épinal." Inexpensive broadsides like these were hugely popular in France in the nineteenth century: naïve woodcuts, brightly colored, featuring images of Catholic saints, Napoleonic battles, and storybook characters. By the turn of the twentieth century, lithography had emerged as the primary printing process, and the range of subjects had greatly expanded, but there was still a market for images printed in the old style, a graphic tradition that influenced modernists from Henri Rousseau to Alfred Jarry. This group of six separate images, printed from blocks on a sheet of Ingres d'Arches paper, may be a publisher's proof. The military and religious subjects include uniformed soldiers on horseback, the Madonna and child, and Saint Hubert's encounter with Christ in the form of a stag. A bright fine example. Single sheet of six woodblock prints, printed recto only and colored en pochoir, measuring… Read More

France: no publisher, no date (early twentieth century). Striking hand-colored sheet of six "images d'Épinal." Inexpensive broadsides like these were hugely popular in France in the nineteenth century: naïve woodcuts, brightly colored, featuring images of Catholic saints, Napoleonic battles, and storybook characters. By the turn of the twentieth century, lithography had emerged as the primary printing process, and the range of subjects had greatly expanded, but there was still a market for images printed in the old style, a graphic tradition that influenced modernists from Henri Rousseau to Alfred Jarry. This group of six separate images, printed from blocks on a sheet of Ingres d'Arches paper, may be a publisher's proof. The domestic and religious subjects include a young woman reaching for a flower, the devotional image of Christ in the winepress, and an angel watching over the city gates. A fine example. Single sheet of six woodblock prints, printed recto only and colored en pochoir, measuring… Read More

No place, 1957. Original caricature by George Wachsteter (1911-2004) of the 1957 Broadway musical Shinbone Alley, starring Eartha Kitt, published in the New York Journal American on April 11, 1957. Co-written by Mel Brooks in his first Broadway book credit, Shinbone Alley was a stage adaptation of Don Marquis' popular Archy and Mehitabel tales, featuring a philosopher-poet cockroach "who had to express himself or die," and his muse, a free-spirited alley cat. Though Shinbone Alley ran only for forty-nine performances, the show was well-received: New York Times reviewer Brooks Atkinson wrote that composer George Kleinsinger "improvised an animal and insect world out of music with humor, drollery, street tunes and juke-box pandemonium." Wachsteter's vibrant image centers Kitt as Mehitabel, dancing in the sparkly tabby-patterned bodysuit that earned costume designer Motley a Tony nomination. Behind her is Eddie Bracken's Archy, hoisting a giant pencil to erase a line on his typewriter, the running gag… Read More

England, nineteenth century. Original silhouette drawing of a prisoner in the hands of two captors, confronted by his accuser, with a woman pleading (presumably for mercy) at the accuser's feet. The figures have the look of shadow puppets, perhaps inspired by a magic lantern show. An evocative piece of Victorian ephemera. Ink and graphite on paper, mounted to a backing sheet. Image measures 5 x 10 inches, matted to 8 x 13.5 inches. Light discoloration to righthand and lower edges of original paper.

England, nineteenth century. Original silhouette drawing of a swooning maiden, what appears to be her armed abductor, and an unarmed (but dashing) rescuer striking a power pose with closed fists. The figures have the look of shadow puppets, perhaps inspired by a magic lantern show. An evocative piece of Victorian ephemera. Ink and graphite on paper, mounted to a second sheet, the whole mounted again to a backing sheet. Image measures 5 x 7 inches, matted to 8 x 10 inches. Occasional stray speck to paper.

Basel: Basilius Presse, 1968. Inscribed first edition of Swiss artist Warja Lavater's dynamic panorama charting the development of painting in the West, from the prehistoric cave art of Pech Merle to Jackson Pollock. Originally a designer of corporate logos and trademarks, Lavater had a genius for the symbol, producing inventive artist's books constructed of minimalist graphic codes and keys. The visual narrative of Sketch...Book is a historical one, focused on the disruptive figure of the painter, the "Disobedient," who is represented by two eyes stacked on top of each other: "With his exterior eye he sees, with his interior eye he thinks." As the centuries and millennia rush by, populated by the flowing black dots who represent the Disobedient's contemporaries, we see glimpses of the painter's radical power of sight: Sumerian glyphs, the golden ratio, medieval illuminations, Renaissance perspective, modern abstraction, captured in flashes and fragments. "This story is history, because the visions… Read More

Bramsche: Gebr. Rasch & Co, 1950. Scarce sample of wallpaper by Laetitia Cerio, Capri-based artist renowned for her spare, whimsical line drawings. Founded in the late nineteenth century, German wallpaper firm Rasch won an international reputation through its collaborations with modernist designers from the Bauhaus and Vienna Secession. In the 1950s and 1960s, owner Emil Rasch commissioned wallpaper designs from artists across Europe, including Salvador Dalí and Bruno Munari, for the International Artists Collection. Cerio's "Spain" paper, featuring delicately tinted views of a Spanish fishing village, dates from this period. A fine example of midcentury popular design. Pictorial wallpaper sample printed in muted colors on an ivory ground, measuring 18 x 15.5 inches. Stamped on verso: "Rasch Waterfast, Spain 1, R 2012, $4.50 single roll.".

Leeds: Bean, Stationer, 1865. Two highly decorative penmanship albums produced by a Victorian schoolboy in Oldham, outside Manchester. Each album contains six examples. The first volume includes three poems and two pages of neatly copied practice sentences: "Eminence demands our most earnest endeavours" and "Magnanimous persons deserve great commendation." The final page contains the sample text of a promissory note, dated February 5, 1865. The second volume includes three poems ("Flowers," "Liberty," and "Various Stanzas on Spring"), each with a hand-colored printed heading, and three practice sentences: "Endeavour to merit esteem and commendation;" "Procrastination often ruins commercial transactions;" and "Concealed resentment is sometimes most dangerous." Unusually handsome examples of Victorian educational practice. Two oblong folio volumes, measuring 9.25 x 12 inches: [16]. Original glazed moiré card wrappers with gilt-embossed card frames and scenic chromolithographs (windmills in a field, a… Read More

No place, 1905. Original illustration by California artist Theodore Hampe (1877-1965) for an unidentified appearance of Mary Howitt's 1829 poem "The Spider and the Fly." The fetching male arachnid luring a female fly into his web represents Howitt's famous opening line: "Will you walk into my parlour?" That overture, often misquoted as "come (or step) into my parlour," remains a widely recognized aphorism for false overtures of friendship. So well-known was Howitt's cautionary tale that Lewis Carroll parodied it in his "Mock Turtle's Song" in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. The expressions of the two figures and exquisite details of their costumes exemplify Hampe's deft hand at small brush technique and mastery of color and shading. The fly perches on the bottommost line of the web, which leads the viewer's eye back to the seductive host at its epicenter, completing a visually satisfying composition. A splendidly detailed and preserved illustration. Watercolor and ink on illustration board,… Read More

London: Michael Joseph, 1961. First edition of Mary Kelly's acclaimed novel, winner of the 1961 Gold Dagger Award, issued by the Crime Writers' Association of the United Kingdom for an outstanding work of crime fiction. When a body is found in a vat of liquid clay at Shentall's, an English pottery of sterling reputation, the detective investigating the leak of the firm's proprietary designs finds himself at the center of a much more serious case. The Spoilt Kill was among the first British crime novels to mark a shift toward the psychological, establishing Kelly as a master of the genre: "It wasn't the whine or cringe of self-pity, just a dull resentful disgust for circumstances and his inability to get clear of them, disgust for himself, that was too weak to possess the dignity of utter humility; a wriggle rather than a writhe." The novel also offers an unusually detailed inside look at the business side of the decorative arts, from production processes to industrial espionage. A near-fine example… Read More

London: William Heinemann, 1932. First edition, second issue, of Graham Greene's thriller, focused on an uneasy group of passengers on the Orient Express as they make their way from Ostend to Constantinople: "the windows shook and sparks flickered like match heads through the darkness." The first issue of the novel was suppressed by Heinemann in response to novelist J.B. Priestley's complaint that the character of "Q.C. Savory" was too obviously a caricature of himself. In this second issue, the character of "Q.C." is renamed "Quin." Following two commercially disappointing novels, Greene was determined to have a success with Stamboul Train: "for the first and last time in my life I deliberately set out to write a book to please, one which with luck might be made into a film." Greene has inscribed this copy with the rueful remark, "Not yet an Entertainment!" Stamboul Train would, however, be repeatedly adapted for film, radio, and television, most notably in the 1934 American picture Orient Express.… Read More

Copenhagen: Gyldendalske Boghandel, Nordisk Forlag, 1938. First edition of this modern Danish children's book, featuring brilliant color lithographs by Aage Sikker Hansen. The narrative celebrates stork life around the world, from Scandinavia to Africa. Hansen's striking cover image would be adapted for use as an iconic travel poster, "Meet You in Denmark," the following year. Text in Danish. A very good copy of a stunning book. Square quarto, measuring 10 x 10.5 inches: [28]. Original tan linen spine, color lithographed boards, pictorial title page and twelve full-color lithographed plates throughout text. Light shelfwear and soiling to boards, occasional spotting to text. Front free endpaper glued to pastedown, upper hinge reinforced.

New York: New Directions, 1947. First edition of A Streetcar Named Desire, Tennessee Williams's first play to win the Pulitzer Prize, signed by the entire original cast, including Jessica Tandy, Marlon Brando, Kim Hunter, and Karl Malden. Produced by Irene Mayer Selznick and directed by Elia Kazan, the original stage production opened in New Haven on October 30, 1947: the program for that first performance is present here, with three ticket stubs from the Shubert Theatre. The show then moved to Boston and Philadelphia before arriving on Broadway, where Tandy would win the Tony for her performance as the fragile, self-deluding Blanche DuBois: "Whoever you are - I have always depended on the kindness of strangers." Wolcott Gibbs, in a rave review for The New Yorker, regretted that "there is no way . . . to convey the effect Mr. Williams achieves in his last act of a mind desperately retreating into the beautiful, crazy world it has built for itself." A wonderful association copy, with related ephemera… Read More

Milan: Presso il Tip. Editore P. Ripamonti Carpano; Presso Virginio Bontà, 1868. Two nineteenth-century Italian gift annuals, in hand-heightened cartonnage bindings featuring portraits of idealized young women. These illustrated collections of sentimental prose and poetry were popular New Year's gifts, easy to read and designed for display. Published in Milan at the height of the Risorgimento era, these highly decorative literary anthologies represent the sort of book in which the ambitious, romantic Angelica Sedàra, the heroine of Lampedusa's The Leopard, would be likely to seek her reflection. Text in Italian. Near-fine examples. Two cartonnage volumes. Strenna Italiana (1859) measuring 9.5 x 6.5 inches: [8], 182, [2]. Original ivory paper-covered boards with hand-colored pictorial lithographic inlay, boards and spine elaborately stamped in gilt with hand-colored decorations, pale pink endpapers, all edges gilt. Pictorial title page, engraved frontispiece and five full-page tissue-guarded… Read More

Carrboro, North Carolina: Truck Press, 1976. Signed first edition of West Virginia writer Jayne Anne Phillips's Pushcart Prize-winning debut, published when she was 24 years old in an unnumbered edition of 400 copies. A collection of short prose fragments, Sweethearts unfolds in a run-down Southern landscape of great natural beauty and pervasive menace: "Six girls giggly drunk jumping out to run circles around an old Chevy at a red light. Hey wait a minute Honey, you dropped somethin. I keep dropping how things went." Many of the pieces in Sweethearts would reappear in Black Tickets (1979), Phillips's first story collection from a major publisher. The book is accompanied by an original broadside advertising a reading by Phillips on June 8, 1976, at the Bull's Head Bookshop at the University of North Carolina. A near-fine signed pair. Single volume, measuring 10.75 x 6.75 inches: [60]. Original buff photographic wrappers printed in black and sepia, blue endleaves, title page printed in blue and black,… Read More

England, 1911. Original watercolor by Norman Ault for his 1911 illustrated edition of Thomas Babington Macaulay's The Lays of Ancient Rome, first published in 1842. A scholar of poetry as well as an illustrator, Ault brought a deep understanding to Macaulay's verse history, retellings of heroic episodes of classical history recited by generations of British schoolchildren. In this dramatic illustration for "The Battle of the Lake Regillus," Ault depicts the armored twin gods Castor and Pollux tearing through the sky on their celestial horses: "Up to the Great Twin Brethren / We keep this solemn feast. / Swift, swift the Great twin Brethren / Came spurring from the east." Castor and Pollux would eventually be transformed by Zeus into the constellation Gemini, serving as patrons to sailors, to whom they appeared as St. Elmo's Fire. A captivating image of the Dioscuri by a great historical illustrator. Watercolor and graphite on board, image measuring 12 x 9 inches, board 13.75 x 9.75 inches. Tipped to… Read More