Comment du Jour

Antiquarian Book Fair in New York!!!!

The 55th Annual Antiquarian Book Fair returned to Park Avenue's iconic red brick 67th Armory with a wider, more eclectic and international group of dealers.  The cavernous 
Park Avenue Armory offered the perfect setting for scores of American and European booksellers as well as map specialists in a setting which I must admit evoked the past and not too long ago glory of New York City antique shows. 

Scores of French and British dealers as well a a fair number of German, Italian, Netherlands, Portuguese, and Spanish booksellers joined in the amazing presentation of the recent, the rare and the historically important.  Les Trois Islets, a longtime show participant from France is pictured above. 

Both these Graham Greene and Ian Fleming novels, while relatively contemporary (fifty years old) were offered by British bookseller Jonkers Rare Books.  Indeed older volumes from this UK bookseller included Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice from 1813, as well as William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies which harks back to 1685.

Another British dealer Leo Cadogan Rare Books returned to the Fair and brought a fine selection of items ranging from Dutch astronomical manuscripts to French and Spanish tracts dealing with both royal and religious matters.  

The seminal legal tract Freedom of the Seas by Hugo Grotius, the Dutch Father of International Law, was a favorite of mine.  This small pamphlet actually, a rare first edition in Latin dating from Leiden in 1609, to this day serves as the basis of international maritime law. The Netherlands dealer Forum & Asher Rare books offered this and a plethora of other hard to fine titles such as the Portuguese Epic 
Os Lusiadas by the poet and explorer Luis de Camoes.  This book from  Lisbon in 1613 is also a rare first edition. 

So many books, so many dealers and so little time!   See you next year!