China in Print 2014
Transcription
China in Print 2014
A Catalogue of Exhibitor Highlights China in Print 2014 Asia’s leading international fair and exhibition for RARE BOOKS, MANUSCRIPTS, PHOTOGRAPHS, & EPHEMERA Friday 21st November 16.00 – 20.00 Saturday 22nd November 11.00 – 19.00 Sunday 23rd November 11.00 – 16.00 www.chinainprint.com Special Exhibitions Gallery, Hong Kong Maritime Museum Central Ferry Pier No. 8, Man Kwong Street, Central, Hong Kong Free Entry China in Print 2014 Now in its third year, from 21-23 November, China in Print 2014 will bring together 26 exhibitors from around the world at Hong Kong’s Maritime Museum. Here we present stock highlights from our exhibitors, including books, maps, photography, manuscripts, and ephemera. The exhibitors are arranged alphabetically. For further details of any item, please contact the exhibitors directly, using the details provided at the foot of each page. ALLSWORTH RARE BOOKS XUNLING [photographer]. Circa 1903. Cixi, Empress Dowager of China [1835-1908]. One Silver print photograph, 17.5 x 13 cm. A very rare survival, a beautiful photograph of Cixi, by the famous Chinese Court Photographer Xunling. In the image, Cixi is enjoying an elegant old age, being almost 70. Allsworth Rare Books P.O. Box 134 235 Earls Court Road London SW5 9FE, UK www.allsworthbooks.com jenny@allsworthbooks.com ANTIQUARIAT MICHAEL STEINBACH THOMSON, J[ohn]. Illustrations of China and its people. A series of two hundred photographs, with letterpress descriptive of the places and people represented. London, Sampson Low, Marston, Low, and Searle, 18731874. First edition of this monumental four-volume photographic work, recording the diversity of Chinese culture during the late 19th century in a wealth of views, portraits, and public scenes. The Scottish photographer John Thomson (1837-1921), a pioneer of photojournalism, was one of the first photographers to travel to the Far East, documenting the people, landscapes and artefacts of eastern cultures. Most of the people he encountered had never seen a westerner or camera before. A fine set. Antiquariat Michael Steinbach, Freyung 6/4/6, A – 1010, Vienna, Austria www.antiquariat-steinbach.com michael.steinbach@antiquariat-steinbach.com ASIA BOOKROOM MASON, George Henry. The Costume of China, Illustrated by Sixty Engravings: with Explanations in English and French. Together in One Volume With: The Punishments of China Illustrated by Twenty-Two with Explanations in English and French. W. Miller. London. 1800 and 1808. 82 full page hand-coloured stipple engravings in total. The Costume of China: 60 plates. 22 plates. Title pages and prefaces in English and French for both works, one leaf of text for each plate, recto in English, verso in French, bound in 19th century half leather, marbled paper covered boards, all edges gilt, marbled endpapers. As is frequently case with copies of this work, the date of the title page and watermarks on some other leaves are at variance. (See Abbey 533 for more information). This copy contains a number of leaves bearing watermarked dates from 1796 to 1817. Some offsetting of plates onto text opposite, frontispiece a little foxed but otherwise the plates are in very good condition with only some occasional spotting. Binding is worn in places particularly at corners, recased, decorative gilt leather backstrip laid down. Quarto. This beautiful volume contains two separately published works that caught the imagination of early 19th century Europe. The 82 handsome engravings are of course one of the reasons these books have been much admired over many years however the accompanying text is also surprisingly detailed and offers an insight into how China and Chinese people were to be viewed for many decades to come. The plates depict both the occupations of the people of China and the punishments meted out to those who transgressed. The original detailed pen and wash illustrations by Pu Qua were commissioned in Guangzhou by Major Mason while was spending some months sick leave at the British Factory. Cordier 1858. Abbey 533. Tooley (English Books with Coloured Plates) 320. Asia Bookroom, Unit 2, 1 - 3 Lawry Place, Macquarie. ACT 2614. Australia www.asiabookroom.com books@asiabookroom.com BATTLEDORE LTD 1950 Portfolio of Political Propaganda "Ninhua" Prints NEW YEAR PICTURES. Woodcut Printing, compiled by the New Fine Art Publishing House. Peking, Printed by Rong Bao Zhai Xin Ji [Jung Pao Chai Hsin Chi], distributed by the Xin Hua Bookstore, 1950. Complete Collection of 16 original colored full-page woodblock prints, with added watercolor, comprising two sets numbered sequentially 1-8 twice, captioned in English, Russian and Chinese + descriptive foreword (in English and Russian). Small 4to, [16]ff laid paper, each print measuring 11-5/8 x 8-1/8 inches (244 x 205 mm) + folded Foreword (9-3/4 x 13-3/8 inches); in blue silk-covered portfolio with pictorial cover label printed in the three languages, rear cover with label "Series # 502". Light exterior wear but overall in very good condition. These woodblock prints were first created and published May 1949 in anticipation of Chinese liberation and the People's Republic of China (PRC) (1949.10.1). Traditional woodblock artists adapted their craft by making political propaganda images, originally captioned only in Chinese for domestic circulation; this 1950 set reprinted the same designs with bolder colors and are captioned in three languages intended for export distribution. Battledore Ltd, P.O. Box 2288, Kingston, NY 12402, USA www.childlit.com/battledore battledore@mail.com BERNARD QUARITCH LTD GONZALEZ DE SAN PEDRO, Francisco. Shengjiao cuoyao 圣教撮要 [A summary of the Holy Teachings]. Fuzhoufu, Meiguitang, 1706. 8vo, ll. [1, recto with the device of the Dominican order within decorated frame; verso with title page], 3, 1, 1, 34; with an additional leaf inserted at head, printed with Latin types on Western paper and trimmed to a smaller size bearing a Latin version of the index; the body of the work printed with Chinese types on rice paper, each sheet folded Chinese style; fold-crease to the last pair of leaves worn (no loss), some scattered foxing, but a very good copy; later wrappers with original title laid on, preserved in twentieth-century boards covered in pink silk. First and only edition, extremely rare, of this epitome of the Christian religion, effectively a catechism, written by the Dominican father Francisco Gonzalez de San Pedro with a preface by Wang Daoxing, a local degree holder from a family which included several Christian converts. The Shengjiao cuoyao plays an important role in the Rites Controversy. Its content reflects the Dominican attitude to Chinese beliefs and lists many of the ‘superstitions’ that had to be abandoned by Christian converts, for the Dominicans, unlike the Jesuits, were firmly opposed to Confucianism and the possibility that Chinese converts might continue with various local practices. The work begins with two sections stressing God’s creation of the world (‘Living beings are not self-created’ and ‘Living being do not acquire life by chance’) and continues with sections on the Yellow Emperor, Buddha, feng shui or geomancy, auspicious days, fortune-telling, angels, soul, feeding hungry ghosts, paper money, the end of the world and the Last Judgment. The work is extremely rare: only one other copy is known to have survived. Bernard Quaritch Ltd, 40 South Audley Street, London, W1K 2PR, UK www.quaritch.com rarebooks@quaritch.com CAVENDISH RARE BOOKS DU HALDE, Jean-Baptiste. Description Géographique, Historique, Chronologique, Politique et Physique de la Chine et de la Tartarie Chinoise. Amsterdam 1736. A superb set in flawless condition of the first quarto edition of this monumental encyclopaedia of European sinophilia. In 18th century French bindings of mottled calf with fully gilt spines and marbled endpapers, complete with 53 engraved plates and city maps including the plan of Peking and a folding map of Canton, and 14 engraved vignettes including a portrait of the K'ang-hsi emperor. Comprising the reports of the 24 Peking Jesuits in China from the late 17th century and meant to show the magnificence of the empire Cavendish Rare Books, 19 Chesthunte Road, London, N17 7PU, UK tel/fax: 44 208 808 4595 Grigorbooks@aol.com CHARLOTTE DU RIETZ RARE BOOKS [OPIUM SMOKER'S PROGRESS]. Jieyan xingshi tu (Pictures to stop [opium] smoking and awaken the world). Hankou, Shengjiao Shuju, 1884. TOGETHER WITH: A set of 12 original black ink drawings by an artist indentified as "Tai, a Christian Chinaman”. 8vo. Printed in xylography. With title page, followed by a hand coloured lithographed frontispiece, two leaves of preface, six leaves with 12 woodcut illustrations and ten leaves of descriptive text. Chinese text printed on double leaves of Chinese paper, folded in the oriental manner. First edition compiled by the Christian religious association and printed at their teaching press (Shengjiao Shuju). Six volumes of the same work, each complete in itself but the coloured frontispiece is different in each volume. As issued in original wrappers with printed titles on upper covers. This work about Opium smoking illustrates the gradual decline and fall of an opium addict. It's most likely based on Hogarth's "Rake's Progress" which also consisted of a sequence of 12 images. We beleive that a total of 12 different lithographed frontispieces (of which six are present here) were issued to accompany the work. Together with a set of 12 contemporary original black ink drawings. Mounted on cardboard with ms captions in English. Size: 11,5 x 28 cm. According to the notes the sketches are originals by Tai, a Christian Chinaman. They might be the originals of the woodcut illustrations in the printed work? Charlotte Du Rietz Rare Books, Sibyllegatan 50A, 114 43 Stockholm, Sweden www.durietzrarebooks.com charlotte@durietzrarebooks.com DANIEL CROUCH RARE BOOKS THE ‘VRIENTS’ ATLAS WITH A LETTER TO EROTIC PRINTS PAST THE INQUISITION. ORTELIUS EXPLAINING HOW TO SMUGGLE HERETIC AND ORTELIUS, Abraham. Theatro del Mondo di Abrahamo Ortelio: Da lui poco inanzi la sua morte riueduto, & di tauole nuoue, et commenti adorno & arrichito, con la vita dell’Autore. Translato in Lingua Toscana dal Sigr. Fillipo Pigafetta. In Anversa, si vende nella nella libraria plantiniana M.DC.XII. Antwerp, Jan Baptist Vrients 1608 Folio (460 by 290mm). 3 parts in one volume, including the Parergon, engraved allegorical title, with letterpress title overslip with full-page engraved portrait of Pope Clement on verso, architectural border to Parergon title, large Plantin device on Nomenclatur title, engraved dedication, portrait of Ortelius, and 5 diagrams in the text, 194 engraved maps on 154 mapsheets, 5 double-page plates of landscapes, all on guards, mostly double-page, FULLY COLOURED BY A CONTEMPORARY HAND AND MANY HEIGHTENED IN GOLD, numerous woodcut ornamental initials, some browning and spotting, title, final leaf and 5 early leaves with margins neatly restored, several small repaired tears, some offsetting. MANUSCRIPT LETTER TO ORTELIUS FROM THE BOOK SELLER JOANNES VRYFPENNINCK loosely inserted, seventeenth century Italian red morocco, central gilt ruled panel with cardinal’s arms at centre and floral cornerpieces, spine gilt in seven compartments, gauffered gilt edges, spine neatly re-backed, edges restored, lightly rubbed. Daniel Crouch Rare Books, 4 Bury Street, St James's, London, SW1Y 6AB, UK www.crouchrarebooks.com info@crouchrarebooks.com A magnificent example of one of the most complete versions of the first printed atlas to be so called, sumptuously bound and with glorious full contemporary colour. The colouring of the present example is particularly fine with careful gold highlighting to many of the maps, particularly on the cartouche tracery, titles and decorative detail. HORDERN HOUSE Edward ASHWORTH (English architect, 1814-1896). Suite of 15 original watercolours of Hong Kong, Macao and Canton, 1844-1846. This series of watercolours of the European enclaves on the South China coast in the mid1840s represents a major discovery. Ashworth’s depictions of Hong Kong in particular were only previously known from a few lithographs accompanying his important essay “Chinese Architecture” (London, 1851, as part of the Architectural Publication Society’s “Detached Essays”; republished in the “Architectural Dictionary” of 1892). Ashworth spent two years in Hong Kong and Macao from early 1844, returning to England via Canton in 1846. An architect himself, he was one of the earliest Europeans known to have built in Hong Kong, arriving just two years after the end of the first Opium war and the foundation of the colony. His time in the colony witnessed an astonishing transformation under the second governor Sir John Davis. During Hong Kong’s first building boom the city dramatically changed shape as new streets were added, often carved into the hillside, while older ones were erased, and the Chinese and European communities forcibly detached. His illustrations of these scenes are an invaluable record of old and new. The nine Hong Kong images represent the earliest significant collection of architectural views, preceding the Scots architect Murdoch Bruce’s lithographs of a similar theme by some two years. Ashworth’s five watercolours of Macao add to the corpus of material explored by previous European painters such as the Daniells, William Alexander, Auguste Borget and George Chinnery, although with a greater urbanity and intimacy to the settings since Ashworth concentrates more on the architecture than the purely picturesque. A final view depicts the European enclave in Canton, the Thirteen Factories, in a completely new, extended and partly rebuilt form after a recent arson attack on them in late 1842. Hordern House Rare Books, 77 Victoria Street, Potts Point, Sydney, NSW 2011, Australia www.hordern.com books@hordern.com JAMES STEERMAN RARE BOOKS QI BAISHI. Pei-ch'ing Yung-pao-ch'ai shih-chien-p'u (北京榮寶齋詩牋 譜) A Rongbaozhai Book of Poems and Paintings. Beijing, Rong bao zhai, 1951. 2 volumes in brocade-covered portfolio, with faux ivory claps. Each volume with (100) color woodblock prints, tie-bound (315 x 225mm). An album of fabulous fine colored woodcuts after the masterful Chinese painter Qi Baishi (1864-1957) and others, produced by artisans under the artists' direction at the newly-collective Rong Bao Zhai studio in Peking. Without question one of the most superb Chinese woodblock print books of its era. An extremely early example containing the full (200) woodblock prints, many examples from this edition contain just (180) prints. Purchased in China in 1951 by a European Sinologist and scholar. James Steerman Rare Books, 57 Market St, Red Hook, NY 12571, New York, USA www.steerman.com james@steerman.com JONKERS RARE BOOKS "THE FINEST BOOK EVER PRINTED“ [KELMSCOTT PRESS] CHAUCER, Geoffrey THE WORKS OF GEOFFREY CHAUCER Now Newly Imprinted The Kelmscott Press, 1896. First edition thus. Folio. Publisher's full white pigskin by the Doves Bindery, binding signed in blind and dated 1897 on the rear pastedown. The covers are elaborately blind stamped and the original metal clasps are intact. All edges gilt on the rough. Ornamental woodcut title, 14 large borders, 18 different frames round the illustrations, 26 initials designed by William Morris and 87 wood cut illustrations designed by Sir Edward Burne-Jones and engraved by W.H. Hooper. Shoulder and side titles printed in red and the whole printed in two columns in Chaucer type designed by William Morris. A near fine copy, with a trace of wear to the spine ends and raised bands, but notably clean boards. A well preserved example of the monumental book. One of 425 copies on paper from a total edition of 438, and one of approximately 50 copies commissioned in this binding. Besides the usual binding of holland-backed blue boards, Morris had originally planned for the Chaucer to have four alternative binding designs in full and half pigskin, to be executed by the Doves Bindery and the firm of J. J. Leighton, who had produced most of the vellum bindings for the other Kelmscott Press books. Because of his illness he was only able to complete the present design, modelled after a combination of South German fifteenth-century bindings, with “many of the tools were copied directly from bindings in Morris’s library” (Tidcombe, p. 47). The lower cover, whose final design was probably completed by Cobden-Sanderson, is known to be modelled after a fifteenthcentury binding in Morris’s own library, a 1478 Koberger Bible bound by the Salzburg binder Ulrich Schreier. ‘Perfect… both in design and in the quality of the printing… the last and the most magnificent, the Kelmscott Chaucer’ (Printing and the Mind of Man). Jonkers Rare Books, 24 Hart Street, Henley on Thames, Oxfordshire, RG9 2AU, UK www.jonkers.co.uk info@jonkers.co.uk LIBRAIRIE ANCIENNE LES TROIS ISLETS [ANONYMOUS. 18th Century]. [Chinese erotic scroll. Spring Palace. Chung Gong Hua.] China, ca. 1750. 1 scroll (193 x 2.500 mm.) composed of 12 painted scenes (ca. 200 mm.). Rice paper on stronger leaves, the extremities of the scroll with silk. Very attractive and rare example of 18th century Chinese erotic iconography, known as painting of the Spring Palace. 11 of these scenes are reproduced in “Erotologie de la Chine”, by Dr. Woo Chan Cheng, who dated the scroll 18th century, because the white, composed of lead oxide, turned black (for the first scenes) because of the light. According to him, this kind of scrolls was pieces of collections and also served for the education of newly wed couples. Very refined and subtle, the style of the present paintings matches the main characteristics of the Chinese erotic iconography that follows models establish during the Ming dynasty. Because this kind of images was first illustrating literature, even after pictures emancipated from the text, they keep a narrative value. Here for example, the scroll starts with a chess game: meaningful scene that reflects the Chinese conception (from Taoism) of sexual relations as a tactic game. The figures of the characters are thin, the faces delicate, a great is taken of the details. As often, the scenes happen in unclosed spaces and the representation of nature echoes the mood of the characters, and catch the spectator eye in a sensible and symbolic web. Considered as one of the singularities of the Chinese erotic painting: the voyeur (here a servant) stands at the door. Fine set. Librairie Ancienne Des Trois Islets, 7, rue du Vieux Clocher, B.P. 20, F-35 800 Saint-Briac-Sur-Mer, France www.librairie-trois-islets.com lib-anc-trois-islets@orange.fr LIBRAIRIE ORIENS BUCHOZ, Pierre Joseph. Collection précieuse et enluminée des fleurs … qui se cultivent dans les jardins de la Chine [A collection of flowers grown in China]. Paris, Lacombe [1776]. Extremely rare and one of the most beautiful botanical books of the 18th Century, with 100 sublimely decorative, contemporary hand-coloured plates, with captions in Chinese characters. Buchoz was the first European to copy the oriental style and aimed this work not just at naturalists and painters, but also at porcelain and textile manufacturers. This volume, in which the highly decorative plates are captioned in Chinese characters, is devoted to flowers native to China, many featuring birds, butterflies and insects, with pale blue skies and rocky backgrounds. 中國花卉圖譜:一百幅印刷水彩图片,1776年巴黎出版 , 長 :45 X 阔 30 公分 Librairie Oriens, 10 Boulevard Arago, 75013 Paris, France www.oriens.fr oriens@sfr.fr LOK MAN RARE BOOKS MEYRICK, William. A Short Account of the remarkable clock made by James Cox in the Year 1766 by Order of the East India Company for the Emperor of China. Printed by Wertheimer, Lea and Co., Finsbury Circus, London, 1868. One of three known copies. One of the most prolific clock and watchmakers of the late seventeenth century was James Cox. He was commissioned by the East India Company to produce a pair of elaborate clockwork automata as a gift for the Qianlong Emperor, following this he sent numerous pieces to China over the next decade and a half. This is the rare account of one of the pair, which is now housed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York [donated as part of the Jack & Belle Linsky collection], the second piece has never been found. The shop of James Cox and Son, established in Guangzhou in 1781 to support the growing demand for their work, was eventually to become the venerable trading company of Jardine, Matheson & Co. Lok Man Rare Books, 6 Chancery Lane, Central, Hong Kong www.lokmanbooks.com info@lokmanbooks.com MAGGS BROS. LTD. DIAZ (Antonio). Diccionario de Lengua Mandarina cuyo primer author fue el R. P. Fr. Francisco Diaz, Religioso Dominico, anadido despues por los RR. PP. desta Mission de Sancto Domingo. Transladado, emendadas algunas tonadas conforme a los Diccionarios chinicos, puestas algunas lettres en las tonadas de otras conforme alos Diccionarios dichos, y anadidas mas tonadas y letras, todo segun los Diccionarios chinicos. [China, Fujian prov.], n.d. [but ca. 1705]. Manuscript. Over 6700 Chinese characters with Spanish definitions in black ink within block-printed pink grids, on a mixture of Chinese and European paper, frequent corrections mostly on small pasted-in slips. 8vo. 19th century russia gilt by Du Planil. Preserved in custom-made quarter morocco box. [iii], 199ff. A very important, unpublished, and apparently unique example of a manuscript Chinese dictionary prepared by the Dominican missionary Antonio Diaz (1667-1715) sometime prior to his expulsion from China in 1707. This work is a superb example of Dominican efforts to study Chinese language availing themselves of the latest scholarship. This challenges the widely held belief that they had little interest in communicating with the higher classes. This dictionary written on Chinese paper in China is a monument to early links between China and the West and it precedes the first printed Western dictionary by roughly 100 years. Maggs Bros Ltd, 50 Berkeley Square, London, W1J 5BA, UK www.maggs.com enquiries@maggs.com MEDA RIQUIER RARE BOOKS LTD ARCHIMEDES. Opera omnia. [THE COMPLETE WORKS]. Basel, Johann Herwagen, March 1544. One folio book (312 x 213 mm.), bound in contemporary vellum. Printed in Greek. Near-perfect condition. Editio princeps of Archimedes in Greek as well as the first complete printing of Archimedes in Latin. ‘Archimedes is by universal consent the greatest mathematician of Antiquity and one of the greatest mathematicians and physicists of all time. Among his contributions were a method for calculating centers of gravity, an approximation of the value of and a system for expressing very large numbers. He demonstrated theorems relating to areas and volumes of figures bounded by curved lines and surfaces, showed how mechanical problems could be solved through geometrical analysis, and made considerable use of proof by the "method of exhaustion", a fore-runner of the calculus. In addition, he is credited with a number of mechanical inventions, such as the water screw, the compound pulley, and various ballistic devices used in the effort to defend the city of Syracuse against attack by the Roman army, a siege in which Archimedes himself perished. His discovery of the principle of specific gravity, when he observed the water displaced by his body in the bath, is celebrated in the well-known story of his running naked through the streets shouting "Eureka". The publication of the present edition marked a decisive step forward in the history of mathematics in that it made Archimedes' knowledge and sophisticated techniques readily available for study, providing a foundation on which Galileo, Kepler, Newton and others could build. The present edition includes Archimedes' works On the sphere and the cylinder, On the measurement of the circle, On conoids and spheroids, On spirals, On the equilibrium of planes, The sand-reckoner, and On the quadrature of the parabola’ (PMM). Horblit 5; Dibner 137; Stillwell 140; PMM 72. Smith, Rara, 226-228; Hoffmann I, 228. Meda Riquier Rare Books Ltd., 4 Bury Street, St James’s, London, SW1Y 6AB, UK www.medariquier.com info@medariquier.com OLDIMPRINTS.COM A Map and History of Peiping. Peiyang Press. Tientsin / Peiping. 1936. Color lithographic map, 88 x 76cm, housed in the back of the twenty-two page explanatory booklet, with decorative slip case. This richly colored lithographic map by Frank Dorn is an outstanding, highly sought-after example of the pictorial map genre. Pictographs show major sites of what is now Beijing as it was pre-World War II, with humorous sketches illustrating the life of the capital. Oldimprints.com, 2732 S.E. Woodward Street, Portland, Oregon 97202, USA www.oldimprints.com imprints@oldimprints.com PABLO BUTCHER Pablo Butcher will be exhibiting a selection of rare books and photograph albums exploring Chinese and Asian themes and culture; plus a scarce suite of Admiralty Charts, circa 1850, tracing the entire Eastern Coast of China and parts of The China Sea to the south. A collection of French, Dutch and English Maritime Charts will map details of Indonesia and its environs. Pablo Butcher, Overy Mill, Dorchester on Thames, Oxford, OX10 7JU, UK www.pablobutcher.fr pablo.butcher@wanadoo.fr PETER HARRINGTON RARE BOOKS TOLKIEN, J. R. R. The Hobbit or There and Back Again. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1937 Octavo. Original green cloth, spine and covers blocked in black, top edge green, map endpapers printed in black and red. With the dust jacket. Housed in a custom box within an elaborate tan morocco-backed slipcase, with gilt lettering and leather onlays to the spine. Frontispiece and 9 full-page uncoloured illustrations after drawings by the author. Bookplate to first blank. Cloth a little faded to the edges, otherwise a very good copy in a brighter than usual jacket that has some nicks to the extremities, a touch of black ink at the upper edge of the front fold, and a little paper restoration to the top edge. First edition, first impression, first issue jacket with the hand-correction to “Dodgeson” on the rear inside flap. The first edition was published on 21 September 1937 and the first impression of 1,500 copies was sold out by December. TOLKIEN, J.R.R. The Lord of the Rings [comprising: The Fellowship of the Ring; The Two Towers; The Return of the King.]London: George Allen and Unwin Ltd, 1954–55 3 volumes, octavo. Original red cloth, titles to spines gilt, top edges stained red. With the dust jackets. A superb set in the uncommonly nice dust jackets lightly and evenly faded at the spines. A really pretty set. First editions, first impressions. The Lord of the Rings trilogy is one of the most influential literary works of the century. The first editions are now increasingly scarce in the original dust wrappers. Peter Harrington Rare Books, 100 Fulham Road, Chelsea, London, SW3 6HS www.peterharrington.co.uk mail@peterharrington.co.uk RULON-MILLER BOOKS Gutzlaff, Karl Friedrich August [愛漢者 Aihanzhe]. 全人矩矱 Quanren juhuo [The perfect man's model]. Singapore: 堅夏書院藏板 Jianxia shuyuan cangban, 1836. 8vo (23.5 cm.), pp. [62] (i.e. title page plus five sections, each with separate pagination: 6, 5, 6, 6, 7 double-sided leaves, for a total of 60 pages); xylographically printed; title page printed on yellow paper; original plain paper wrappers; fine. With several holograph corrections in the text, possibly authorial. A religious tract, translated roughly as "The perfect man’s model….treatise on the teachings of the Holy Scripture, in 5 books, on unfeigned virtue, spiritual instruction, the Saviour, explanation of the law, theory of prayer, and the doctrine of Jesus true and self-evident" by a Protestant missionary, Karl Gutzlaff, a fascinating character, typical of the sort of opportunist who clustered around the opium business in the old China Trade. In the 1830s he traveled as a translator on a British opium sailing vessel, known as a "country ship" illegally selling opium for Jardine, Matheson & Co. down the coast of China. Gutzlaff justified his complicity with the rationalization that the journey would be a good opportunity to preach the gospel and distribute religious tracts printed in Chinese. His moral flaws aside, Gutzlaff was a smart and lucid observer whose writings offer excellent detail about China and the China Trade in the days leading up to the first opium war. In his later days he opened a school for native Chinese missionaries, several of whom turned out to be opium addicts who used their missionary cover and funding for illicit purposes. The fraud exposed, Gutzlaff died a ruined man. Rulon-Miller Books, 400 Summit Avenue, St. Paul, MN 55102-2662, USA www.rulon.com rulon@rulon.com SHAPERO RARE BOOKS HEATH, Leopold. Views of Hong Kong Island and Vicinity. London, by the Hydrographic Office c. 1847. ONE OF THE EARLIEST AND FINEST PANORAMIC VIEWS OF HONG KONG, SHOWING THE WHOLE OF THE ISLAND FROM ANCHORAGE. Three sheets, each measuring In 1843 Leopold Heath (later Admiral Sir Leopold) was appointed Gunnery Lieuenant of HMS Iris commanded by Captain George Rodney Mundy. On one of his visits to Hong Kong in 1846 he drew a view of the harbour as seen from his ship. This series was seen by the Hydrographic Office to be of a good standard and was published in 1847 as a set of three black and white prints selling for three shillings. These supplemented the chart made from the first British survey of Hong Kong harbour by Commander (later Captain Sir Edward) Belcher RN, who had landed on the island in 1841, just in advance of the naval squadron arriving to take formal possession of the Colony. Shapero Rare Books, 32 St George St, London, W1S 2EA, UK www.shapero.com rarebooks@shapero.com SOPHIE SCHNEIDEMAN KELMSCOTT PRESS. MORRIS, William. The Tale of The Emperor Coustans and of Over Sea. Hammersmith, Kelmscott Press, 1894. One of 500 copies printed on paper, in black and red in Chaucer type by William Morris at his Kelmscott Press. Small 8vo, at the beginning of the nineteenth century by Riviere in extremely attractive full green morocco covered in floral tooling in gilt on both sides with onlaid brown morocco borders and gilt lettering on spine and upper cover, spine in compartments, decorated in gilt with raised bands, top edge gilt, others uncut, signed by Riviere & Son in gilt on upper turn-in, marbled endpapers. Internally the book is a very clean, uncut copy. This tale of love, faith and chivalry was translated by Morris from the medieval French text. A very elegant copy. Petersen A26 The Schneideman Gallery, 331, Portobello Road, London, W10 5SA, UK www.ssrbooks.com sophie@ssrbooks.com WATTIS FINE ART Commodore’s Log, HMS Sibylle, 1855-1857, manuscript in bound, proforma logbook. This manuscript log book was kept for Captain the Hon. Charles Gilbert John Brydone Elliot RN in 1855 to 1857 during the run up to the 2nd Opium War, whilst he was Commodore of a detached squadron, including the steamers HM Ships Barracouta and Hornet and the old frigate Pique, charged, in concert with a French squadron, ‘to intercept the Russians’. Despite many pages being devoted to the Sybille’s voyage north to Japan and Sakhalin in 1855-56 and to her sojourns in Whampoa, much of the logbook relates day-to-day life in Victoria Harbour, where the Sybille would have been anchored between the Hong Kong Maritime Museum and the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre. Whilst not the full ship’s log, being only the Commodore’s private record, this fascinating document contains sufficient detail in its daily entries for us to follow the Sybille and her consorts on their peregrinations. The bare narrative of ship’s events, however, reveals little of the lands visited. For example we are told almost nothing of the detail of the visit to Hakodate on Hokkaido, at a time when the suppression of the indigenous Ainu people was not yet complete. The log provides a detailed grasp of the routine tedium of life in a man of war come wind, come weather. And it shows graphically how little like the great setpiece 19th and 20th century wars familiar from history books the two Anglo-Chinese wars were. Whilst shots were being vigorously exchanged two miles upriver, in Whampoa life went on as normal and the Sybille embarked and disembarked her Chinese pilots Ashing and Aping as the need arose. Wattis Fine Art, 2/F 20 Hollywood Road, Central, Hong Kong www.wattis.com.hk info@wattis.com.hk AND LIBRAIRIE ALAIN BRIEUX Librairie Alain Brieux, 48, rue Jacob - 75006 Paris, France www.alainbrieux.com alain.brieux@wanadoo.fr LIBRAIRIE ANCIENNE INDOSIAM Librairie Ancienne INDOSIAM, 89 Hollywood Road, Apt A 1/F, Central, Hong Kong www.livre-rare-book.com/c/b/indosiam indosiam@hotmail.com YUSHODO Yushodo Co. Ltd., 27 Sakamachi, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 160-0002, Japan www.yushodo.co.jp antiq@yushodo.co.jp
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