Rudy & Midge
by Eberle, Matt
Madison, Wisconsin: Dangling Participle Press, 1998. First edition of this dreamlike artist’s book about travel, memory, and storytelling, “a search for what connects people,” number 33 of 35 signed copies printed and bound by Matt Eberle at his Dangling Participle Press. Rudy & Midge was inspired by a collection of midcentury travel ephemera found at an estate sale. The... Read More
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Two sets of painted wooden counting blocks
by [EDUCATION]
Barnard, Vermont: Vermont Toy Works, 1980. Two sets of brightly painted counting blocks, proportionally sized, each labeled with its corresponding numeral and that number spelled out. When housed in their trays, each column of blocks must add up to ten. Out of their trays, the blocks can be used to solve simple addition and subtraction problems, or for free... Read More
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Silas Marner: The Weaver of Raveloe
by Eliot, George
Edinburgh and London: William Blackwood and Sons, 1861. First edition of George Eliot’s third novel, a fable of love and redemption set in a realistically detailed, rapidly industrializing England. Silas Marner, a weaver cast out of his community and despised as a miser, is saved by the unexpected arrival of a newly orphaned little girl: “We see no white-winged... Read More
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Scenes of Clerical Life
by Eliot, George
Edinburgh and London: Blackwood, 1858. First edition of George Eliot’s first published work of fiction, three related stories of love and loss in an English village: “The Sad Fortunes of the Rev. Amos Barton,” “Mr. Gilfil’s Love-Story,” and “Janet’s Repentance.” The stories first appeared anonymously in Blackwood’s Magazine in 1857, and were published together the following year as the... Read More
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Silhouette illustration: The Hero Arrives
by [EPHEMERA]
England, nineteenth century. Original silhouette drawing of a swooning maiden, what appears to be her armed abductor, and an unarmed (but dashing) rescuer striking a power pose with closed fists. The figures have the look of shadow puppets, perhaps inspired by a magic lantern show. An evocative piece of Victorian ephemera. Ink and graphite on paper, mounted to a... Read More
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Silhouette illustration: The Recognition
by [EPHEMERA]
England, nineteenth century. Original silhouette drawing of a prisoner in the hands of two captors, confronted by his accuser, with a woman pleading (presumably for mercy) at the accuser’s feet. The figures have the look of shadow puppets, perhaps inspired by a magic lantern show. An evocative piece of Victorian ephemera. Ink and graphite on paper, mounted to a... Read More
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Four silhouette illustrations on storybook themes
by [EPHEMERA]
England, nineteenth century. Four original silhouette drawings on storybook themes: a turbaned group in Eastern costume with a hookah; an armed highwayman and his target; two figures dueling; and a traveler with pack and pipe. The figures have the look of shadow puppets, perhaps inspired by a magic lantern show. An evocative piece of Victorian ephemera. Four ink and... Read More
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Original nineteenth-century painting of shopkeepers at work
by [EPHEMERA]
No place: no publisher, nineteenth century. Detailed original painting of two shopkeepers, likely husband and wife, doing the accounts for their business as the sun sets. The pair sit at a double-sided writing desk, in intent conversation over the day's papers. A bookcase of ledgers stands to their left. A panel to the right depicts a storeroom stacked full... Read More
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American dance orchestra signs, in original wooden case
by [EPHEMERA]
United States, late nineteenth century. Six hand-painted signs used by an American dance orchestra to alert the audience to the proper steps. John Spitzer observes that in nineteenth-century New York, “hundreds of orchestras played on a daily basis in theaters, restaurants and beer gardens, concert halls, circuses, and amusement parks. The ubiquity of the orchestra in nineteenth-century American cities... Read More
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Magazin d’Antiquité et de Beaux-Arts (trade card)
by [EPHEMERA]
Paris, 1840. Trade card for an antique shop located on the Rue Saint-Lucie in the former commune of Grenelle, now part of the fifteenth arrondissement of Paris. In addition to antiques, the Magazin d’Antiquité et de Beaux-Arts offered modern objets d’art: marble carvings, engraved seashells and volcanic rock (“pierres du Vésuve”), models of ancient temples, copies of classical sculpture... Read More
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Dessin (design workbook)
by [EPHEMERA]
France: no publisher, 1950. Commercially produced graph paper workbook for French design students, with striking blue wrappers lettered “Dessin.” A fine example of an ephemeral midcentury classroom aid, never used. Side-stitched design workbook, measuring 8.5 x 6.75 inches: [16]. Original deep blue wrappers lettered in black, sewn with white thread; leaves printed with a grid pattern.
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The Fairy Drama of Marina; or, The Truant Heart (theatrical playbill)
by [EPHEMERA]
Loton Park, Shropshire: R. Davies, Printer, 7 High Street, Shrewsbury, 1845. Privately printed playbill for a Victorian theatrical performed by the children of Loton Park, the ancient Shropshire seat of the Leighton family, on January 17, 1845. The performance of “The Fairy Drama of Marina; or, The Truant Heart” was the opening entertainment of an evening hosted by Baldwin... Read More
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Vive la Bagatelle (engraved fan design)
by [EPHEMERA]
[London]: Sarah Ashton, No. 28, Little Britain, 1797. Original example of London fan maker Sarah Ashton’s delightful “Vive la Bagatelle” design, published on New Year’s Day in 1797. Instructing its bearer to “live, love, & laugh,” this “conundrum fan” offers hours of diversion in the form of riddles, jokes, and word games, scattered across the fan in a tromp... Read More
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No Dress Rehearsal, Baby
by [EPHEMERA]; Woolf, Virginia; Chandler, Raymond; Nabokov, Vladimir; Anouilh, Jean; Stevens, Wallace; Whitridge, Thomas (printer)
New York: Ink, Inc, no date. An uncommon and compelling collection of fine press literary broadsides by Ink, Inc., a graphic design, printing, and print-brokerage house established in 1978 by Thomas Whitridge. The title sheet includes the first eight lines of Wallace Stevens’s 1947 poem “Notes Toward a Supreme Fiction,” printed at upper left. The Virginia Woolf broadside includes... Read More
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Heroes and Heroines
by Farjeon, Eleanor and Herbert; Thornycroft, Rosalind (illustrator)
New York: E.P. Dutton & Co, 1933. First American edition of the Farjeons’ comic verse history of real-life heroes and heroines, a sequel to their popular Kings and Queens, illustrated by Rosalind Thornycroft. Featured historical figures include Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Charlemagne, Joan of Arc, Christopher Columbus, Pocahontas, Napoleon, Horatio Nelson, Florence Nightingale, and Buffalo Bill. Each subject... Read More
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Here & There: A Fashion View with a Point-of-View. June 1978
by [FASHION]; Horn, Francine (editor)
Westport, Connecticut: Here & There, 1978. June 1978 issue of Here & There, Francine Horn’s groundbreaking fashion trend report, advising American retailers on the upcoming European fall collections. The only photo story in the issue, “The London Collections (Fall ‘78),” is also the largest. A statistical analysis of the new styles purchased by three hundred French retail stores at... Read More
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Here & There: A Fashion View with a Point-of-View. September 1978
by [FASHION]; Horn, Francine (editor)
Westport, Connecticut: Here & There, 1978. September 1978 issue of Here & There, Francine Horn’s groundbreaking fashion trend report, focusing on haute couture, Japanese fashion, and resort wear: “The posh stuff is back in line for Fall ‘78.” Forecasting a year in advance, the pages reveal trendsetting European designs for Fall 1979 alongside their American counterparts, with lively editorial... Read More
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Woolflash Paris 74. Winter/Hiver Prêt-à-Porter
by [FASHION]; Stone, Skippy (editor); Huré, Jean-Luce (photographer)
Paris and New York: International Wool Fashion Office; The Wool Bureau, 1974. Ephemeral 1974 trend report on Parisian knitwear for American designers and showrooms, issued by the International Wool Fashion Office in Paris and The Wool Bureau in New York. Editor Skippy Stone declares: “Fall 1974. . . Total from top to toe. Paris is everything that is at... Read More
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Decorative Art in Wisconsin
by Foote, Anne; Smedal, Elaine; Lord, Clifford (introduction)
Madison, Wisconsin: Screen Art Company, 1948. First edition of this vibrant portfolio celebrating Wisconsin decorative traditions, “designs from handicraft articles either brought to Wisconsin or made here by the early settlers, or by members of the three largest native Indian tribes.” Included are examples of Chippewa beading, Norwegian baskets, Polish Easter eggs, Winnebago blankets, German embroidery, and everyday objects... Read More
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A Likely Place
by Fox, Paula; Ardizzone, Edward (illustrator)
(London): Macmillan, 1967. First edition of this early children’s title by Newbery winner Paula Fox, the story of an anxious (and anxiously watched) young boy: “Everyone wanted to help Lewis. That's why he was thinking of running away.” Lewis’s life improves markedly when his parents leave town, and a free-spirited sitter allows him to roam after school. Publishers today... Read More
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The Odd Woman and the City
by Gornick, Vivian; [Millett, Kate]
New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2015. First edition of Vivian Gornick’s meditation on being a woman and a writer in New York City, warmly inscribed to fellow feminist critic and New Yorker Kate Millett, author of Sexual Politics (1970). Raised in the Bronx, and based in Manhattan, Gornick describes the city as the source of her own creative... Read More
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Hanging Loose 2
by Gross, Mimi (envelope design); Schreiber, Ron (editor); Lourie, Dick (editor); Jarrett, Emmett (editor); Levertov, Denise (contributing editor); Katz, Elia; Piercy, Marge; et al.
Brooklyn: Hanging Loose, 1967. Second number of this long-running little magazine devoted to emerging and underrepresented writers, founded in 1966 at the Brooklyn apartment of poet and contributing editor Denise Levertov, who had taught Jarrett and Laurie. Simultaneously democratic and ephemeral, its original format, a sheaf of loose mimeographed sheets tucked in a mailing envelope, inspired its name: “If... Read More
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Publisher's promotional mobile for The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
by [Haddon, Mark]
London: Jonathan Cape, 2003. Mobile produced by publisher Jonathan Cape to promote Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (2003), one of the first contemporary novels to feature an autistic narrator. Marketed to both adults and children, the novel won the Whitbread Award and the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize, was long-listed for The Booker Prize,... Read More
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Der Spatz im Zirkus “Potztausend alle Welt”
by Hanhart, Josef; Schaub-Filliol, Claude (illustrator)
[Neuallschwil/Basel]: Heuwinkel, 1963. First edition of this stunning circus-themed picture book, featuring a sparrow who flutters in and finally out of the spectacular world of the big top: “Du bist frei.” The vibrant linocuts are the work of Swiss artist Claude Schaub-Filliol, noted for her work in ceramics and sculpture as well as graphic design. Text in German. A... Read More
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The Return of the Native
by Hardy, Thomas
London: Smith, Elder & Co, 1878. First edition of Thomas Hardy’s sixth novel, one of 1000 copies. Set amid the wild landscape of Egdon Heath, the tension between two unhappy couples, pulled together and then apart, produces the mounting sense of dread so characteristic of Hardy’s later fiction: “To be conscious that the end of the dream is approaching,... Read More
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