What's better: a simple author signature, or an inscription? As a longtime bookseller -- a veteran of Borders, Waldenbooks, and independent bookstores -- I thought I knew the answer. But, once I began working for antiquarian booksellers, I discovered the question is much more complex.
A comment on the ABAA Facebook page recently asked why some booksellers appear to prefer plain signed books, rather than inscribed ones? While trying to find the answer, I encountered an interesting tale of changing fashions and the dark side of book collecting.
The prevailing wisdom in literary circles over the past decade or two has been to ask an author for a plain signature when getting a book autographed (some collectors even purchase two copies, asking the author to inscribe one to them for their 'permanent collection,' and to simply sign their name to the other one, which they will hold onto in the hopes its value appreciates -- sellers of new books have no qualms about endorsing this point of view, although antiquarian booksellers know there is no certainty of modern firsts becoming valuable collectibles, and strongly caution collectors against viewing them as such). To my shame, I've organized and helped run hundreds of book signings and never previously gave this standard advice much thought.
The theory was that such a plain signed book might be more valuable or 'collectible' than one inscribed to an individual personally because some later potential buyer might be more interested in a book signed "Stephen King," than a book signed "To Harry, Best Wishes from Stephen King." While I myself might appreciate looking back over my library and recalling an entertaining dinner with fantasy author Greg Keyes when he signed a book for me and we gossiped about the book industry over several bottles of wine, why would anyone else be interested in the cryptic comments added by an author? (My advance copy of Greg Keyes' The Briar King is inscribed "Hope you still have this one in six years." Baffling to anyone but me.*)
Antiquarian booksellers look at inscriptions in a different light. ABAA-member Ken Lopez writes "when you buy a signed book you are purchasing a signature, but when you buy an inscribed book you are getting a story." Part of the skill of the antiquarian bookseller is to be able to decipher and tell that story. One of the issues with a plain signed as opposed to inscribed book is that it lacks provenance. Inscriptions -- even if they are not to a famous household name -- often have a story behind them that can prove provenance.
Featured item:
THE SEVEN AGES (Signed, First Edition)
by Glück, Louise
(New York): Ecco Press, 2001. First printing. Fine in near fine jacket.. Signed first edition of the Pulitzer- and Nobel-winning poet's ninth poetry collection, a striking sequence of nature- and mythology-inflected verses. 9'' x 6''. Original quarter black cloth with grey boards. In original unclipped ($23.00) dust jacket. 68 pages. Signed by Glück on title page, crossing out her printed name. Some light marginal toning to jacket. Book clean and tight.
Offered by Type Punch Matrix.
Since the advent of the internet, anyone can put an alledgedly signed book for sale online, and most online auction sites like eBay do little to police the authenticity of their offerings. Some unscrupulous online sellers offer so-called certificates of authenticity with their signed books; these are simply not worth the paper they're printed on. The ABAA guarantees that a signed book purchased from one of its members is genuine, and that is one reason that obtaining membership for the ABAA is a long and exacting process -- only the most experienced, ethical, and knowledgible booksellers are accepted!
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Lopez adds some historical context to the current confusion over the relative value of signed versus inscribed books by explaining that for "a long time -- generations, literally -- there was a clearly established hierarchy of values that pertained to books signed by their authors. The best copy was the 'dedication copy,' and usually there was only one of these. Next best were 'association copies,' that is, books inscribed by the author to someone notable or important in the author's life -- a relative, a friend, a mentor, another writer. After that were 'presentation copies,' which simply meant those books inscribed by the author to someone who was not important to the author, or whose importance was unknown. And finally, at the bottom of the hierarchy, were books that were just signed, with no further inscription, no other writing, etc."
Various factors owing to attempts to game the system and people enticing authors to inscribe books to them despite having no personal relationship began to cause booksellers to look askance at certain inscriptions to these "false fans" in the 1970s and '80s, and collectors picked up on this new sense of suspicion over certain inscriptions, and some began to view plain signed books as more desirable. Then came the internet, and the largely unregulated marketplace of eBay and other online auction sites. Some antiquarians now feel that the pendulum is starting to swing back, and once again the principle of, in Lopez's words, "the more writing by the author in a book, the better" is beginning to reassert itself. (You can read Ken Lopez's more detailed thoughts on signed books versus inscribed ones here...)
Featured item:
The Big Sea (Inscribed, First Edition)
by Hughes, Langston
New York & London: Alfred A. Knopf, 1940. First edition. 335 pp. 8vo. Original green cloth. A few spots to boards, spine fading and slightly cocked. First edition. 335 pp. 8vo. Inscribed to his Friend Noël Sullivan, at Whose Farm he Finished the Book. Inscribed on the ffep: "For Noel, and Hollow Hills - happy island in The Big Sea - where this book was finished. Affectionately, Langston Hotel Grand, Chicago, July 26, 1940."
In March 1932 Noël Sullivan, a wealthy aspiring concert singer and a patron to liberal and artistic causes, sent Hughes a note of his admiration with an invitation to visit him in San Fransisco. Sullivan, whose housekeeper Eulah Pharr had friends in common with Hughes, had recently performed one of Hughes's poems in concert, set to music by John Alden Carpenter. Hughes stayed with Sullivan in May 1932 while on a lecture tour, and the two developed a very close friendship. "The man and all he stood for endeared him to Hughes, and for a quarter of a century he was the poet's most trusted confidant. [...] as close a friend as any relative Hughes ever had..." (Berry, Faith, Before & Beyond Harlem: A Biography of Langston Hughes, p. 149-150). This was a two-way street, as "Hughes's immediate impact on Noël Sullivan was...dramatic" (Rampersad, The Life of Langston Hughes, Vol. I, p. 239). Sullivan helped sustain Hughes with occasional financial gifts, he hosted him on most of his visits to California, often gave Hughes the use of his farm in Carmel, where Hughes wrote his first collection of short stories, The Ways of White Folks (1934), which was dedicated to Sullivan.
By August 1939, Hughes was determined to "forge his autobiography into 'a real titan's book,'" and he settled at Noël Sullivan's Hollow Hills Farm in Carmel to complete the autobiographical work he started in Chicago, in which he describes his time in Paris (Rampersad, Vol. I, p. 373). He returned again to Hollow Hills in December of 1939 to celebrate the Christmas holidays before heading back to the East Coast. While on the road, he missed the Carmel Valley, writing Sullivan, "'Your farm, Noel, is a little heaven" (p. 381-2). By late July 1940, Hughes headed again to Hollow Hills Farm, where he found construction beginning on a one-room cottage was building for Hughes's use.
Offered by James Cummins Bookseller.
The recent popular wisdom favoring plain signed books not only flies in the face of long-established preferences, but, Lopez believes, also "diminishes and demeans collecting, and collectors":
"For not only can a presentation copy to an unknown third party "turn into" an association copy after a little research, but a collector's own copy can become an association copy if the collector stays with it long enough and seriously enough for the collection to become recognizably important. Hemingway's first bibliographer was Louis Cohen, a fan and book collector. A Hemingway book inscribed to Cohen would, at the time, have been a simple presentation copy to a person of no particular consequence. Today it would be viewed as a highly desirable association copy."
ABAA members go to great lengths to research inscriptions and establish whether a book has genuine literary associations or not. One terrific example of the fruits of this research is the description provided by James S. Jaffe Rare Books for a presentation copy of Sylvia Plath's first book of poetry, The Colossus, which she inscribed to Lucas (Luke) Myers, a fellow poet and intimate of Plath and Ted Hughes, who was in their circle when Plath first met Hughes in Cambridge in 1956. Plath was influenced by Myers' poetry, and in fact wrote that she was dancing with him at the launch party for the St. Boloph's Review just moments before meeting Ted Hughes! Clearly this is a copy with great significance for collectors of Plath and Hughes. (Read that description here...)
An appreciation of the history behind a certain volume and how some inscriptions reflect the larger currents of an author's life or work shows that such dedication, association, or presentation copies are far more desirable than any plain signed copy.
Coda: Recently, I (briefly) joined a large Facebook group focused on rare books, and was horrified to see a lively discussion about inscribed books wherein so-called experts advised people to erase the inscription if possible, glue a bookplate or blank piece of paper over it, or simply tear the page out (!) in the misguided notion that these methods would magically make the books in question more sought-after. ABAA members and informed collectors would never advocate such things! Defacing a book does not make it more desirable.
Video: "Presentations and Provenance: How Signatures Add Value to Books"
ABAA-member Joshua Mann of B&B Rare Books discusses the value signatures bring to rare books at the 2023 New York International Antiquarian Book Fair.
* The story behind the inscription in my copy of The Briar King is that I had met Greg Keyes years earlier, at a science-fiction convention just before his first novel, The Waterborn, came out. I brought a promotional blad (an excerpt from the novel bound for promotional purposes) which the author had signed at our first meeting to the dinner six years later, which spurred a great discussion about his career and experience over the intervening years.
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Some signed and inscribed books of interest:
by Tokarczuk, Olga
Riverhead, 2022. first. hardcover. fine/fine. SIGNED first US printing, as stated on copyright page. Signed on a bookplate attached to half-title page. Book and dust jacket fine, unread, small crease at bottom of spine at both. Olga Tokarczuk was the 2019 winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Offered by Bookbid.
by Harlan Ellison
Greenwich, CT: Gold Medal Books (Fawcett Publications), 1961. Original wraps. Very Good +. Mitchell Hooks. SIGNED BY BOTH HARLAN ELLISON AND THE ARTIST MITCHELL HOOKS (WHO DESIGNED THE WONDERFUL FRONT COVER) on the title page. A crisp, very sharp copy to boot of the October 1961 stated 1st printing. Clean and VG+, with two thin creases (one at the spine, the other at the front cover's outer hinge) running from top to bottom. Paperback original, Gold Medal s1161. "Stag Preston, idol of millions -- whose private life was wilder than any of the songs he sang."
Offered by Appledore Books.
The Bingo Palace (Signed)
by Louise Erdrich
Northridge, California: Lord John Press, 1994. Hardcover. Fine. First edition. Fine in quarter gilt morocco in marbles boards with fine cloth slipcase. One of 26 lettered copies Signed by the author. Although not marked in any way, this copy is from the distinguished modern first edition collection of Bruce Kahn.
Offered by Between the Covers Rare Books.
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values
by PIRSIG, Robert M.
NY:: William Morrow,. Near Fine. 1984. Hardcover. New introduction by the author. Tenth Anniversary Special Limited edition: this copy is number 522 of 1,000 copies. SIGNED by the author. Small spot of foxing on top edge, else near fine in a near fine (some light shelf wear) slipcase. ; 412 pages; Signed by Author.
Offered by Grendel Books.
by W. Somerset Maugham
New York: George H. Doran, 1915. Full description: MAUGHAM, W. Somerset. Of Human Bondage. New York: George H. Doran, [1915].
First American edition, second issue. With the misprint of "help him" on line 4 of page 257 corrected and with stamping on front and spine in black rather than gilt. And without the Doran monogram to copyright page. In a later issue jacket. A gift inscription card reading "From her friend W. Somerset Maugham" laid in. Octavo (7 1/2 x 5 3/8 inches; 192 x 132 mm). [vi], 648 pp.
Publisher's original green cloth stamped in black on front cover and lettered in black on spine. Some minor rubbing to head and tail of spine, along outer hinge and corners. Inner hinges starting but holding firm. Text is very clean. In later publisher's jacket. Jacket with chipping to head and tail of spine. Some splitting along folds. Jacket panels rubbed and spine a but sunned. Still a very good copy.
"The novel is generally agreed to be Maugham's masterpiece and to be strongly autobiographical in nature, although he stated, 'This is a novel, not an autobiography; though much in it is autobiographical, more is pure invention.' Maugham, who had originally planned to call his novel Beauty from Ashes, finally settled on a title taken from a section of Spinoza's Ethics." (Wikipedia).
Offered by Heritage Book Shop.
E PLURIBUS VENOM: The Art of Shepard Fairey
by Fairey, Shepard, Sarah Jaye Williams, and Jonathan Levine
Corte Madera, California: Gingko Press in association with Obey Giant, 2008. First Edition. Hardcover. Near fine. Inscribed by Shepard Fairey on the title page, with a Barack Obama "HOPE" sticker laid in. Prepared in conjunction with a massive exhibition at the Jonathan Levine Gallery in the summer of 2007, this catalogue features images overtly and obliquely addressing such issues as war and peace, the environment, and the economy. In addition to series of antiwar posters critical of the war in Iraq, it also includes something unique to Fairey's oeuvre: immense murals that co-opt the classic filigree motif of stock certificates and American currency. Quarto: [144] p. with numerous illustrations (many color). Original pictorial boards over a green cloth spine with gilt titles. Light rubbing to the corners; else near fine.
Offered by johnson rare books & archives.
by Lawrence, D.H.
Florence: Privately Printed, 1928. First Edition. First edition, copy #416 of 1,000 numbered copies signed by D. H. Lawrence, privately printed and available by subscription only. [iv], 365 pp. Bound in publisher's purplish brown paper-covered boards with front board stamped with black phoenix design, paper title label to spine. Near Fine, a little professional repair to spine with joints discreetly reinforced, few small stains to boards, faint production crease to prelims. An attractive copy. Housed in a custom morocco-backed slipcase. A groundbreaking and controversial novel for its time, Lady Chatterley's Lover was banned in both England and America, and not published in the latter until 1959.
Offered by Burnside Rare Books.