GENERAL READING GOOD USED BOOKS
[This is a Mainly-20th-Century General Reading & Reference File]
A-K   •   L-Z

“Hai-Kai”

•  Inscribed by the author on p. viii. Limited to 2000 copies of which this is copy # 1117. Profusely illustrated with drawings and photographs.

•  Publisher's green cloth, with an attractive design on the front cover. Very light rubbing over joints, and soiling to front cover. Pages clean. Very good. (5895)

“America Underfoot”

Click the image for an enlargement.

•  Profusely illustrated with black-and-white and color reproductions of drawings and photographs. Chapter titles include “Sand and Straw,” “Painted Floors and Floorcloths,” “Oriental Rugs,” “'Turkey Work' and the Axminster Carpet,” “Folk Rugs,” “The Great American Carpet Industry,” and “The Second Revolution: The Tufted Carpet and Other Modern Innovations.”

•  Paperback. Fine.  (5324)

Reading Copy

•  First edition. "Criterion Miscellany -- No. 11."

•  Roberts A52. Publisher's cloth. Lacks d/j. Text loosening from binding. Nick on spine. Dusty. (5556)

Medical Education

•  First edition. The author, a professor of clinical medicine at the NYU School of Medicine, "takes a critical look at the evolution of medical education and physician training," and its effects on current clinical medicine.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a very good dust jacket.

(LISTS). . . .

SIMPLE Book Lists . . .

We've created a new series of book lists for you!  Most of the usually budget-priced books in these simple, unillustrated, EXTENSIVE catalogues are not offered via any of the databases (e.g., ABE, Biblio, ILAB); they are mostly not described here at our independent website either. It's “find 'em in these lists or come find 'em on our shelves”!

Click:  The LIST of  LISTS  

Ceramics

•  Sixth edition. Illustrated with color & black-and-white photos and drawings.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, no dust jacket.

Interesting Reading & Interesting Illustration

The British Museum: Egyptian antiquities.

Click the images for enlargements.

•  An very informative account of the museum's holdings as of the first third of the 19th century, highly illustrated with wood engravings that are sometimes full-page, mostly in-text.

“Published under the superintendence of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge” and in the series “The Library of Entertaining Knowledge.”

•  Publisher's light brown cloth, covers stamped in blind, spines lettered in gilt; one board cracked under cloth across outer corners and one volume rubbed in places to the board. Black tape at top of each volume extending on to the covers; extremities of one volume chipped, endpapers with abrasion or a bit of chipping Ex–social club library: each volume with a 19th-century bookplate, call number on endpapers, pressure-stamp on title-pages, no other markings.  (28752)

Slightly Random Reading . . . A Striking, Unusual Cover Treatment

Click the images for enlargements.

•  Two volumes from a popular and oft-reprinted survey of history originally published in 1883. The present books cover “The Old Pagan Civilizations,” “Jewish Heroes and Prophets,” “Great Women,” and “Great Rulers.”

Bindings: Publisher's textured dark brown cloth, covers with globe and torch design stamped in rich shades yellow, red, green, and black; spines embossed with modest "ruling" and author, title, publisher, volume numbers.

•  Vols. I and IV only. Bindings as above, slightly shaken, extremities rubbed. Pages clean.  (29812)

In Italian

•  Poetry in Italian, with introduction in English.

•  Very good in maroon publisher's cloth, framed in blind, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped title; very minor edge and corner wear. All edges gilt. Silk bookmark present. (3105)

[Lytton, Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer–Lytton, 1st baron]. Leila; or the Siege of Grenada. By the author of "Pelham,"... complete in one volume. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1838. 8vo.
$75.00

•  Pirated first American edition. In the same year editions appeared in Cincinnati (!) and Philadelphia.

•  Publisher's cloth, waterstained, cloth with a few tears; shows wear. Paper spine label. Some foxing.

•  First edition. A story about a young man unfairly locked up in an insane asylum for seven years for throwing his mother's lover into a swimming pool. Upon his release, he sets out on a journey across America "to catch up with the life he has missed."

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a very good dust jacket.

His First Novel

•  First trade edition, first issue. The first novel of the former co-anchor of PBS's "MacNeil/Lehrer Newshour," Robert MacNeil.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a good dust jacket; short tear at the top front panel of dust jacket.

Sailing Around

•  First edition. With photographs and maps.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a good dust jacket; some nicks along the lower edge of the jacket's near panel and head of the spine.

Martin, Helen R[eimensnyder]. Martha of the Mennonite country. Garden City & New York: Doubleday, Page, & Company, 1915. 8vo. [3 (1 blank)], frontis., [4 (1 blank)], 3–318, [2 (1 blank)] pp.
$25.00

•  Born and raised in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Helen Martin succeeds in depicting the customs of the Pennsylvania Dutch in rich and accurate detail. The binding is signed by the designer with his/her monogram (not deciphered).

•  Publisher's green cloth, front covers stamped with a farm house and lettered in gilt. Spine extremities tender and a little soiling to gilt on spine. Pencilling on front free endpaper.

A Very Autobiographical Comedy

Click the images for enlargement.

•  First U.S. edition of this comedy about literary identity and the attentions paid to a successful author, based on a real-life incident in which a European baroness began to write to Moore following the appearance of his Evelyn Innes. This was a limited edition of 895 numbered copies, of which the present example is no. 351.

•  Publisher's quarter cream parchment paper and blue paper sides, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped leather title-labels, in original blue-gray paper dust jacket with black-stamped title and edition information; binding in beautiful condition, jacket with small edge chips and spine head splitting. Pages clean. A nice copy.  (29707)

Plays aboutSouthern Life

•  First trade edition, first issue. First performed in Savannah, Georgia, in 1985. Taken word for word from the letters of the Charles Colcock Jones family, the dramas combine the family's story with an examination of life in the antebellum South.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a very good condition.

Chicanery & Deception

•  Nice reprint of a compilation of articles by Lotte Hellinga, Michael Treadwell, Michael Harris, Joseph M. Levine, Nigel Ramsay, Nicholas Barker, and Tom Davis, originally published in the famed St. Paul's Bibliography series in the wake of a conference in London in 1988 at which all were present. The conference occurred without anyone attending knowing that, in the U.S., a major scandal in the forging of Texas printed historical documents was just beginning to blossom.

•  New. Publisher's illustrated boards.  (27539)

Picture History ofThe Big Apple

•  First edition. Illustrations on nearly every page.

•  Publisher's cloth. Cloth sunned. Good copy, no dust jacket.

Irish History

•  First American edition, later issue. This book is about the relations between the Irish Catholics and Protestants and also "between the two political entities created by those relations."

•  Publisher's cloth. Spine sunned. Good-plus condition.

First Paperback Edition (1943)

•  First paperback edition, probably first printing. No. 31 from the New Avon Library series. List of new titles (nos. 23-31) printed on inside of back cover. Three pages of advertisements in the back.

•  Original wrappers. Very light rubbing to spine and at edges. Rear cover with a single 2" crease, some wrinkles on spine. Mildly age-toned. Very good. (7181)

O'Neill, Eugene. Days without end. New York: Random House, ©1934. 8vo. 157 pp.
$27.50

•  First trade edition, first issue.

•  Publisher's cloth; no dust jacket.

•  First trade edition.

•  Original cloth; no dust jacket; front hinge starting.

•  First trade edition.

•  Publisher's cloth; no dust jacket; owner's name in ink on front free endpaper.

•  First trade edition.

•  Original cloth; no dust jacket; covers discolored, rear one seriously.

•  First trade edition.

•  Publisher's cloth; no dust jacket; rubber stamp on front free endpaper; spine sunned; covers spotted.

•  First trade edition.

•  Original cloth; no dust jacket.

Spenser Susan Hawk Trouble

•  First trade edition, first printing.

•  Fine copy in fine dust jacket, the flaps unclipped and retaining original price and month/year printing code.

Peterson, Roger Tory. A field guide to the birds. Illustrations by the author. Boston and Cambridge: Hougton Mifflin Company (Riverside Press), 1947. Small 8vo.
$30.00

•  Second revised and enlarged edition. Covers North American birds east of the Rocky Mountains. With color drawings.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, no dust jacket.

Phillips, Wendell. Speeches, lectures, and letters. Boston: James Redpath, 1863. 8vo.
$30.00

•  Fifth edition.

•  Publisher's cloth. Top of the spine pulled; stains on covers and shaken. Fair condition. Top edges gilt.

Yes, That Pinkerton

•  First edition was 1880. Front cover with gilt–stamped eye and the legend, " WE NEVER SLEEP."

•  Publisher's cloth, a bit soiled and a little worn.

Inscribed (NOT! by Plato)

•  First edition. Inscribed by the translator/commentator.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a very good dust jacket.

Inscribed . . . 

•  Privately printed. Inscribed by the author.

•  Perforation binding with printed covers as issued.

A Study ofEskimo Life

•  Later edition. First published in 1941. The author, a French aristocrat, recounts his travels in the Arctic wilderness and his life among the Eskimos, still untouched by modern civilization. With drawings and photographs.

•  Paperback. Very good condition.

English Literature between the Wars

Pritchard, William H. Seeing through everything

•  "An introduction to the period and a summary of its principal literary art."

•  Excellent condition. Small tear in dust jacket.

Robinson, Edwin Arlington.  The glory of the nightingales. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1930. 8vo. 83 pp.
$45.00

•  First trade edition.

•  Publisher's green cloth, light spotting, spine slightly sunned.

MUSIC HISTORY

•  Later printing. An equal treatment of all musical periods from ancient times to 1948.

•  Publisher's cloth. Good-plus condition.

A Classic of Modern American Poetry

•  First trade edition of this important collection from a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet. Click the images for enlargements.

•  Publisher's blue cloth, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped title; edges and extremities lightly worn, spine darkened, evidence of something round once set on cover, scattered small spots of light discoloration. Interior clean and nice. (26682)

(Scott). Hutton, R.H. Sir Walter Scott. London & New York: Macmillan, 1894. 8vo.
$10.00

•  In the "English Men of Letters" series edited by John Morley.

•  Publisher's cloth, lightly soiled. Lacks front free endpaper. Interior clean.

Kuomintang China — The Soongs

•  Book Club edition. This is the story of the Soong family and their in-laws, among whom were Sun Yat-sen and Chiang Kai-shek, and their rise to great power and wealth in pre-Communist China. A genealogical tree is provided on the endpapers.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a good dust jacket. Jacket creased and with short tears.

Shaw, [George] Bernard. Back to Methuselah. A metabiological pentateuch. London: Constable, 1922. 8vo.
$50.00

•  The first English edition; preceded by the New York edition, which Shaw condemned for its numerous misprints.

•  Laurence, Bernard Shaw: A Bibliography, A161. Publisher's green cloth. Incipient foxing at fore-edges. Residue of sticky substance on back cover.

Shaw, [George] Bernard. Back to Methuselah. A metabiological pentateuch. London: Constable, 1922. 8vo.
$18.00

•  The second English edition, containing a considerable number of alterations.

•  Laurence, Bernard Shaw: A Bibliography, A161. Publisher's green cloth. Incipient foxing at fore-edges.

•  First published in German in 1908, and in English in 1911. This claims to be the "Seventh Impression."

•  Laurence, Bernard Shaw: A Bibliography, A108 (for first edition in English). Publisher's green cloth. Incipient foxing at fore-edges.

For a SERIOUSLY IRISH “shelf,”  click here.

Camelot

•  Second edition.

•  Publisher's cloth. Good-plus condition. Gift inscription on the title-page.

The Catholic Church & Its Dissenters

•  Partially unopened copy of the first edition of Shoberl's indictment of the Catholic Church for the oppression of dissenters in the pre-Reformation era and of Protestants beginning with the Reformation. The chapters generally address one dissenting group each, and the history of the Church's reaction to it.

Binding:  Publisher's light brown near-herringbone cloth, covers elegantly stamped in border-and-medallion style in blind, with spine quite interestingly embossed in blind in “compartments” and lettered in gilt.

•  Bound as above, spines sunned and upper corners bumped; tops of spines slightly discolored and each with slight tearing in same area. A few gatherings carelessly opened, in one case with upper outer corners torn across yet no actual loss. Ex–social club library, and each volume has: 19th-century bookplate, call number on endpaper, no other markings. A nice set.  (28758)

Virginia Settlement Stories

•  First edition of this anthology. Illustrations reproduced from contemporary drawings. Attractive typography with archaic spellings.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a very good dust jacket.

Simple Title. Pretty Fascinating Reading.

•  First U.S. edition, from the “International Scientific Series”: scientific examination of the cultivation and properties of a wide variety of foods, including tea, coffee, and wine. The volume, which includes several 14th-century recipes, is illustrated with plates and in-text wood engravings. Click the images for enlargements.

Original edition, not a modern reprint.

•  Publisher's oxblood cloth, covers decoratively stamped in black, spine black- and gilt-stamped; corners and spine extremities rubbed, sides with small areas of minor discoloration, spine sunned with paper shelving label at head, a little cocked. Ex–social club library: call number on endpapers, rubber-stamp on title-page and four others. Final blank leaf excised. Clean, sound for use.  (27367)

Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr I. The gulag archipelago 1918–1956. An experiment in literary investigation I–II. Translated from the Russian by Thomas P. Whitney. New York and elsewhere: Harper & Row, 1973, 1974. 8vo.
$20.00

•  Book Club edition.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a good dust jacket.

•  History Book Club edition with an indication on the verso of the title-page of its being the first U.S. trade edition, first issue.

•  Publisher's cloth. Small coffee stain on inside of front flap. This offering includes a clipping of a June 1978 Washington Post book review. Very good condition, in a very good dust jacket.

His Lyrics

•  Woodcut title-page, head- and tailpieces in the art nouveau style; engraved portrait of Spenser as the frontispiece.

•  Very good. Green publisher's cloth, spine and front cover amply gilt in the art nouveau style. Edges and joints rubbed, small abrasion to front cover. Pages untrimmed and partially uncut. Top edge gilt. (3142)

WISCONSIN

•  1877–79 edition of what was generally an annual report, commenced in 1855. Topics covered include “Ancient Copper Mines of Lake Superior,” “Indian Wars of Wisconsin,” and “Early Times at Fort Winnebago”; the volume is illustrated with representations of cave designs from La Crosse Valley. Click the images for enlargements.

Provenance: Title-page with affixed presentation slip from the State Historical Society; front free endpaper with affixed envelope flap addressed to the Rev. E.A. Dalrymple of Baltimore, MD.

•  Publisher’s cloth, spine with gilt-stamped title. Binding sturdy but with portion of spine cloth missing, exposing underlying material; corners bumped, extremities very lightly rubbed. Front pastedown with institutional stamp. Pages slightly age-toned, else clean.

Illustrated

•  First edition, second printing, issue A. Illustrated by Reginald B. Birch.

•  BAL 18934. Publisher's decorated cloth, spine sunned.

Avant-Garde Short Stories — Cutting-Edge Criticism

Click the image for an enlargement.

•  First editions of the first and second series of selected pieces from an important late 19th-century literary periodical: one volume of essays and one of short stories. Each title-page is printed in red and black, with a gaily colored publisher's vignette. The first volume includes Boyesen writing on Ibsen's new play (“Little Eyolf”), John Burroughs on writing and criticism in general, Alice Morse Earle on three different topics including the merits (or lack thereof) of professional writing revision services, Maurice Thompson on the relative oldness of “The New Woman” and on “The Return of the Girl,” and many other interesting essays on the state of contemporary life and literature.

The second volume contains “The Sands of the Green River” (Neith Boyce), “The Unsullied Brow of the Viceroy” (Edwin Lefévre), “The Saving of Jim Moseby” (Anthony Leland), “The Escape” (Dabney Marshall), “Dick” (Maria Louise Pool), “The Primrose Dame” (John Regnault Ellyson), “When His Majesty Nicholas Came to England” (Clinton Ross), “At 'The Temple of Unending Peace'” (Alfred Dwight Sheffield), “The Tumbrils” (Nathaniel Stephenson), “Gil Horne's Bergonzi” (Maurice Thompson), “Her Last Love” (Clarence Wellford), “A Little Boy of Dreams” (Beatrice Witte), and “The Wolf in Sheep's Clothing” (Edith Franklin Wyatt).

Bindings:  Both volumes in publisher's pinkish-tan cloth, all edges gilt. Vol. I's spine in dark blue, each cover with A.E. Borie's Art Nouveau design of a woman walking down the street while reading, stamped in black, green, yellow, and blue. Vol. II's spine in red, covers each with striking black and red reproduction of Claude Bragdon's Chap-Book poster of the “Sandwich Man”: a vignette of a bowler-hatted man in triplicate, wearing Chap-Book sandwich boards.

•  Vol. I: Binding as above, minimal shelfwear, faint smudging to sides. Pages with a few instances of pencilled marks of emphasis, mostly but not entirely confined to the first essay, pages otherwise clean. Vol. II: Binding as above, very slightly cocked, sides with faint spots of discoloration, light wear to extremities. Two stories with faded inked marks of emphasis, and one with a few pencilled marks; a very few small spots of staining, pages otherwise clean.  (29013)

His Works inONE Thick Volume

•  The lithographic title-page is in red and black with a portrait of Swinburne.

•  Very good. Red textured publisher's cloth, simply gilt. Gilt on spine darkened. Corners and head and foot of spine rubbed. Occasional pencilled underlining. (3154)

Doubleday, Doran's First Book

•  First trade edition. This is the first book printed by the then-newly formed firm of Doubleday, Doran. A limited edition of 500 copies, signed by the author and the publisher's preceded this edition.

•  Tattered dust jacket, missing pieces along top edge.

Taylor, Maxwell D. Responsibility and response. New York, Evanston, & London: Harper & Row, 1967. 8vo.
$22.50

•  First edition. Based on General Maxwell Taylor's 1966 lectures on U.S. military policy delivered at Lehigh University.

•  Publisher's cloth. Cloth has white discoloration, possibly paint or chalk. Good-plus condition.

Ballet — AHANDY Basic Resource

•  First edition, second issue. Contains entries for more than 500 ballets. Each entry includes brief synopses and historical background; choreographic, musical, and scenic credits; the names of the companies which produced them, and information on the premiere performance. Also includes a brief history of ballet, a guide on "How to Look at Ballet," and a glossary of ballet terms. With 101 photographs.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a very good dust jacket; price clipped from front flap of dust jacket.

Tonge, W. Lawton, M.D., D.P.M. The mending of minds. Psychiatric illness and its treatment: A guide for families and patients. Henley-on-Thames, UK: Darwen Finlayson, 1970. 8vo.
$20.00

•  First edition. What they thought back then.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, no dust jacket.

"His Cruel & Excessive Suffering"

•  A later American edition. Stereotyped.

•  Speckled sheep, black spine label. Joints and hinges open, one chip to spine. Minor foxing and staining.

MAPS Matter . . . .

•  Later edition. With 6 fold-out and 31 in-text maps; and five genealogical trees.

•  Publisher's cloth. Reading copy, hinges cracked.

A Big Book Documenting a Big Era

•  “Three themes dominate the period covered by this book . . . the consolidation of the new nation-states . . . religious persecution and the wars between Catholic and Protestant . . . the expansion of Europe over the whole world” (from the dust-jacket). The volume is extensively illustrated in color and black-and-white; this is a work of art reference as well as historical reference.

•  Publisher's terra-cotta cloth, front cover and spine with gilt-stamped title, corners bumped yet cloth pristine, in dust-jacket; wrapper with wear at corners and spine extremities, one short edge tear to upper front edge. Pages age-toned; clean and unmarked.  (26183)

A Capital Crimes Mystery Novel

•  First trade edition, second issue. In the Capital Crimes series.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a very good dust jacket.

"Men & Manners" — Oxford, 1926

•  First edition of this social history with numerous illustrations, including full-page.

•  Good in publisher's cloth, front cover with gilt-stamped floral vignette, spine slightly faded and worn at head and foot. Front free endpaper with gift inscription dated 1926. (3089)

Boccaccio on Chestnut Street — English Libretto

•  Libretto in English; front cover with an engraved portrait.

•  Good in original printed paper wrappers, faintly waterstained; pages with small edge tears and chips. (2485)

Americans "Abroad"

•  Intelligent (and intelligible) literary criticism.

•  Publisher's cloth. Short tears and chips to edges of dust jacket; price clipped. Near fine; dust jacket good.

A Gift, Perhaps?

•  Collected love poems from the great names of English literature, gathered in sections with themes like "Love's Tragedies," "Love and Nature," "Chivalric Love," and "Love with Many Lyres." The engraved title-page vignette shows three cupids at play.

•  Blue publisher's cloth, spine with simple gilt-stamped rules and title, front cover with gilt-stamped "GTS" device (for the Golden Treasury Series). With an 1896 gift inscription on half-title. Pages gently age-toned. (5538)

Historian, & Man of Letters

•  First edition.

•  Paperback. Very good condition.

Astronomy — Inscribed

•  Second edition, revised. Inscribed by the author. With lots of black-and-white photographs and drawings.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, no dust jacket.

A Great"Gilded Age" Architect

•  First trade edition, first issue. Biography of late 19th century architect Stanford White whose works, from the neoclassical Knickerbocker Trust Company and the Pantheon-inspired Gould Library to Madison Square Garden, transformed the landscape of the northeastern United States.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a very good dust jacket.

White, William Allen. The autobiography of William Allen White. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1946. 8vo. 669 pp.
$10.00

•  Book club edition. Black and white photos. A "Mid-American" life, still an interesting one.

•  Publisher's cloth in original dust jacket; soiled and worn with tears. Shaken.

Wilson, Edward O. On human nature. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, © 1978. 8vo.
$20.00

•  Third printing. The central themes of the book are "Is human behavior controlled by the species' biological heritage? Does this heritage limit human destiny?"

•  Very good condition, in a very good dust jacket.

The Court in a Critical Era
    But then, what era Wasn't/Isn't?

•  First edition, third printing of this study of the Supreme Court and its justices, 1969–75.

•  Very good. Blue publisher's cloth, spine gilt lettered. Original dust jacket, somewhat rubbed. (3100)

"TO THINE OWN SELF BE TRUE"

•  First edition. In the Folger Shakespeare Library's series of Tudor and Stuart documents. Three manuals to better conduct, written during the 16th and 17th centuries.

•  Publisher's cloth. Very good condition, in a very good dust jacket.

Unintended Consequences

•  First edition, first issue. The author's reflections on the "unlearned lessons" of the 20th century: The reasons why statesmen, even after achieving their objectives, "so often failed miserably because they had overlooked the side-effects of that kind of success."

•  Publisher's cloth. Offsetting on endpapers from a newspaper obituary (of the author) having been laid in. Very good condition, in a very good dust jacket.

With an INTRODUCTION BY the Poet

•  First U.S. edition, with an interesting introductory essay by Yeats.

•  Good in publisher's cloth, spine gilt-stamped; slightly cocked, with small discoloration to front cover. Upper edges gilt. (3125)

What It's Like to Be One . . .

•  First edition. Illustrated by Nicholas A. Rosato. A light-hearted look into what it's like to work in wildlife law enforcement in Pennsylvania. This book tells it like it is and is a must-read for anyone who enjoys the outdoors.

•  Publisher's light-blue cloth, stamped in silver. Fine, in a near fine dust jacket. (5880)

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