Bookseller News

Browse the latest catalogs, newsletters, and e-lists of rare books, fine bindings, incunabula, print ephemera, and much more from the members of the ABAA below. (Also includes podcasts, blog posts, and other digital formats.) *New* indicates any catalogs brought to our attention since the early October 2024. AARDVARK BOOKS/EZRA TISHMAN BOOK APPRAISALS SABF 2024 Highlights 16 Recent Aardvarkian Acquisitions Featured item: Delafield, Emily Prime (Illustrated by Bertram Goodhue) ALICE IN WONDERLAND : A PLAY : COMPILED FROM LEWIS CARROLL'S STORIES ALICE IN WONDERLAND AND THROUGH THE LOOKING-GLASS AND WHAT ALICE FOUND THERE.; Originally presented, for the benefit of The Society of Decorative Art, at The Waldorf, New York, March thirteenth, 1897, and now for the first time printed. NEW YORK: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1898. FIRST EDITION. Hardcover. 8vo. Lovely, paper-covered boards, brilliantly colored -- Bertram Goodhue's genius dances off the late nineteenth-century page, and still pops -- powerfully -- into our 21st century consciousness -- 125+ years later! 1-1/2-inch spot (spilled turquoise ink) to top left of rear board, and a repaired 1 1/2 in. x 1/2 in. closed tear to paper over spine. A play with characters from the Carroll classic,including of course Alice in Wonderland, The White Rabbit, The Queen of Hearts, The Knave, Humpty Dumpty, Tweedledum and Tweedledee, The Cat, The Mad Hatter, etc., Gorgeous color Illustrations to both covers by the legendary typeographer and font-in... [more Latest Catalogs of Rare Books]

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Latest Members of the ABAA

By Rich Rennicks

Meet the latest booksellers to have been granted membership of the ABAA. Full Members Daylon Orr, Fugitive Materials, Brooklyn, New York Daylon is a bookseller, archives broker, and publisher with a focus on underground, oppositional, queer, and non-Western histories. Born in Tucson, Arizona and raised in Brooklyn, he graduated from Hunter College with a BA in Postcolonial Literature and Critical Theory. After nearly a decade as an archivist and rare bookseller, Daylon founded Fugitive Materials in 2020. Fugitive Materials specializes in radical, underground, and oppositional histories with a focus on the material cultures of resistance: the detritus of radical social movements; histories of labor; policing, and prisons; radical pedagogy; anti-colonialism and protest in Latin America, Africa and the Middle East; and underground art. Daylon is a member of the Bibliographical Society of America (BSA), and a graduate of the Colorado Antiquarian Book Seminar (CABS). He is also the host of Fugitive Materials Radio on Montez Press Radio, exploring under-recorded histories through interviews with activists, artists, and intellectuals. Ernest Rodriguez, The Rose Books & Obscurities, Monterey, California Ernest J. Rodriguez, proprietor of The Rose Books & Obscurities, is a first-generation rare bookseller specializing in early 19th and 20th-century Western Esoteric literature and 17th-century Rosicrucian and Alchemical works. Ernest first started acquiring rare books some nine years a... [more Latest Members of the ABAA]

Position Announcement: Rare Book Cataloger, Burnside Rare Books Burnside Rare Books is seeking a full-time rare book cataloger to join our small but growing team. Starting salary is in the range of $45,000-$75,000 commensurate with experience. All work is to be done in person at our offices in Portland, Oregon. Primary duties are cataloging and researching new inventory, maintaining inventory control, photographing books, working with customers to sell books, shipping orders, and basic office duties. This position may require travel to book fairs or to meet with clients, and other duties may be assigned. Qualified candidates will possess either an academic background in rare book cataloging, or practical experience cataloging for a rare book firm or auction house. This position requires attention to detail, excellent writing and verbal communication skills, strong research abilities, a demonstrated knowledge of book history and the care and preservation of rare books, a professional and client-oriented demeanor, and the ability to occasionally lift boxes of material up to 50 lbs. Please email cover letter and resume to info@burnsiderarebooks.com. No phone calls or visits please. [more Job Opening: Rare Book Cataloger at Burnside Rare Books]

As the current president of the ABAA, I have been attending the biannual Congress of the International League of Antiquarian Booksellers (ILAB), the umbrella organization that brings together national Associations from around the world. Our hosts in Amsterdam have outdone themselves! The main Congress was preceded by meetings to discuss official ILAB business. The protection of cultural property, while pursued for the noblest of reasons, can lead to incredible bureaucratic burdens and even become counterproductive if people familiar with the actual function of the book trade aren't involved in shaping policy. Fortunately, ILAB's Executive Secretary Angelika Elstner has been elected to the European Union's Art Market Expert Group to provide precisely this kind of input. Among other contributions, ILAB has shown that Interpol's figures for stolen library materials were wildly exaggerated. For example, it claimed that 472,933 pieces of “Library material” had been seized in the past year, which, if true, would mean that the book trade was awash in literal mountains of stolen goods. ILAB was able to show that almost the entire figure derived from a single 500-year-old family archive in Italy that was confiscated by the state as part of a dispute over legal ownership. In point of fact, ILAB and its affiliates are always eager to protect the integrity of institutional collections, and now ILAB has a voice in the European Union to help shape policies that sustain this goal withou... [more ILAB Congress in Amsterdam: Business and Pleasure]

The CABS-Minnesota Antiquarian Book Seminar celebrated its 48th year this July on the campus of St. Olaf College. The class of over 50 convened for an intensive week of hands-on instruction and informal conversations about the book trade, including impromptu book shops in the dorms and a lecture from specialty dealer Alexander Akin of Bolerium Books. 22 of the students were supported by scholarships, including from the ABAA Woodburn Fund. Find out more at www.bookseminars.com. [more 2024 CABS-Minnesota Antiquarian Book Seminar]

Over the past half century, Second Story Books has provided the greater Washington, DC metropolitan area access to an unlimited and rich reading experience. From their original small second floor location on Connecticut Avenue, Second Story Books, an ABAA/ILAB member since 1976, has evolved as an internationally respected bookseller dealing in antiquarian and out-of-print books, art, ephemera and general used books with two locations. In this interview, owner and founder Allan Stypeck discusses his long career in bookselling and appraising and his parallel career in television and documentary making. On the present: One of the traditional advantages of having a walk-in bookstore in Washington D.C. was the customer base, consisting of local residents, tourists, and the large federal government bureaucracy, which includes the collateral organizations and law firms associated with the government (aka the K Street Corridor). The average Washington-area family demographic is above average with two-income, college-educated households and was thought to be recession proof. With the advent of the Covid outbreak, that stability was greatly challenged. Like the rest of the country, we were forced to shut down operations for over a year and then reopen with very restrictive social distancing regulations. Compounding these issues was the reality that the majority of government workers primarily began working remotely and tourism became almost non-existent. Local Metro ridership (essentia... [more Allan Stypeck: 50 Years of Bookselling]

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September Brown Bag

By Rich Rennicks

Edit: The recording of this event is now available on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfeHt5PvU6U The Antiquarian Booksellers' Association of America was founded in 1949 to promote interest in rare and antiquarian books and book collecting, and to foster collegial relations. The association invites you to attend the September Brown Bag Lunch Series, a panel discussion: Meet the ABAA: Demystifying the Application Process. You'll gain insights into the present-day ABAA, membership benefits, and how to become a part of it. The panelists will include the president and the executive director of the ABAA, as well as ABAA members Robin Beck of Primary Sources and Sunday Steinkirchner of B & B Rare Books. The webinar is moderated by Lizzy Young, ABAA member and the Chair of the Gender Equity Initiative. September 24th @ 2 PM ET Meet the ABAA: Demystifying the Application Process CLICK HERE TO REGISTER Panelists: Alexander Akin, President (member since 2019) Alexander Akin, co-owner of Bolerium Books in San Francisco, specializes in radical political ephemera, Chinese books, and publications of Asian-American immigrant communities. He is the current president of the ABAA. Susan Benne, Executive Director Susan Benne has worked in the rare book trade for 25 years. She began her career cataloging children's and illustrated books for a rare bookseller in New York, then moved into managerial roles, first as the director of the New York Antiquarian Book Fair, then as th... [more September Brown Bag]

Edit: The recording of this event is now available on our YouTube channel. The Brown Bag Lunch Series, presented by the ABAA Gender Equity Initiative, is a series of short virtual talks covering various topics, from crash courses in areas of expertise to best business practices. Please join the Gender Equity Initiative on Zoom on Tuesday, August 27th, 2024, at 2 PM ET for a Brown Bag Lunch Series with Alexander Akin. Alexander Akin, co-owner of Bolerium Books and current president of the ABAA, worked as a professional numismatist before becoming involved in the book trade. In this talk, he will explore an area of personal interest at the intersection of these worlds: poetic inscriptions on currency. We will see Persian couplets celebrating everything from territorial conquest to love for a beautiful partner, expressions of passionate religious piety, and a classical Chinese poem turned into a numbering system in Korea. August 27th @ 2 PM ET At the Intersection of Literature and Numismatics: 1,600 Years of Poetry on Money Alexander Akin, Bolerium Books CLICK HERE TO REGISTER Alexander Akin, co-owner of Bolerium Books and current president of the ABAA, holds a BS in Anthropology from UC Riverside and a PhD in East Asian Languages and Civilizations from Harvard University. He worked as a professional numismatist before becoming involved in the book trade. Photo by Meredith Nierman. [more Brown Bag Series: August]

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New ABAA Members

By Rich Rennicks

Meet the latest group of booksellers elected as members of the ABAA. Full Membership Obadiah Baird - The Book Bin For almost fifteen years Obadiah Baird has specialized in rare and collectible Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror, while also running The Book Bin's two large general interest shops in Salem and Corvallis Oregon. A second-generation member of the ABAA, Obadiah has exhibited with his father, at book fairs up and down the west coast and as far away as York England. With an eye towards attracting a new generation of collectors, he has expanded the kind of genre material you can expect to see at an Antiquarian Book Fair, placing signed first editions of popular current authors alongside classic works in the field. Now a full member of the ABAA in his own right, Obadiah looks forward to connecting collectors to the perfect book (or pulp magazine, or script, or fanzine) for years to come. Kevin Sell - The Rare Book Sleuth Kevin Sell is a bookseller with more than 15 years of professional bookselling experience. Born and raised in northern Minnesota, Kevin began his bookselling career at brick-and-mortar shops, selling both new and used books, before starting The Rare Book Sleuth, a full-service online bookshop. His primary focus is on modern first editions, with an emphasis on literature, science, philosophy and counterculture, although his generalist tendencies often find him expanding in new directions. Kevin holds degrees in philosophy and psychology, is a graduate ... [more New ABAA Members]

Edit: The recording of this event can be viewed on our YouTube channel or below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U43Q7qerAEI The Brown Bag Lunch Series, presented by the ABAA Gender Equity Initiative, is a series of short virtual talks covering various topics, from crash courses in areas of expertise to best business practices. Please join the Gender Equity Initiative on Zoom on June 19th, 2024, at 2 PM ET for a group panel with Zhenya Dzhavgova, Andy Nettell, and Lizzy Young on a discussion unveiling who they are and what they do aside from being a rare book dealer. June 19th, 2024, at 2 PM ET REGISTER HERE Zhenya Dzhavgova, ZH Books Zhenya was born and grew up in Bulgaria at the tail end of Communism, in the Valley of Roses, where the highest quality rose oil in the world is produced. Her hometown is also the geographical center of the country. She went to college in Sofia, the capital, graduated with a degree in computer engineering, then came to the US in 2003. She returned to school and worked as a nanny and high-school math tutor. In 2010, in between jobs, she had been buying books at estate sales for herself and occasionally selling them, so when she heard of CABS, she applied for a scholarship, and the rest was history. She became a member of the ABAA in 2016, the same year her beautiful daughter was born. In 2021, right in the middle of the pandemic, She got very sick but got better, and then exactly a year later, in 2022 - she got even sicker. Immediately after reco... [more June Brown Bag Lunch Series]