Five Rare Books for Collectors: York Book Fair 2023

York Book Fair

York Book Fair poster

York National Book Fair, running since 1974, has become the largest rare, antiquarian, and out-of-print book fair in the UK and Europe. The 2023 fair, featuring books, prints, maps, and ephemera, takes place at York Racecourse over two days, September 15-16, with around 200 booksellers. Highlights include:

York Book Fair

York Book Fair poster

* To the “Arts Club” A token of gratitude from Belgian artists for the kind hospitality bestowed upon them during the great war

Unique commemorative album to be presented to the London based “Arts Club” on Dover Street, Mayfair, by 30 Belgian World War I refugee artists containing 32 original artworks from the period (1915)-1925, in a commissioned deluxe binding, original artworks in various techniques (drawings, etchings, watercolours, gouaches, lithographs), by i.a. Emile Claus, Marcel Jefferys, Alfred Jonniaux, Leon de Smet, Pierre Paulus, Louis Reckelbus, Valerius de Saedeleer, Belgium, ca.(1915)-1925).

Fahrenheit 451 Antiquarian Booksellers
 

* The New Temple Shakespeare (40 Volumes)

First thus (1934-36), including one reprint (Hamlet, 1938). 40 small 8vos, incl. notes and glossaries, housed in a custom period wooden bookcase (40 x 30 x 12cm). Title, half-title, binding designs by Eric Gill (five variations, excepting William Shakespeare: A Commentary, which features a unique title page decoration and illustration). Red cloth, gilt-stamped lettering to spines and gilt embossed series device to upper boards. A robust set, delightfully housed in the custom period bookcase. Unusual.

Quair Books 

* O G and other Ogres by Reginald Reynolds

A first edition hardbakc copy with illustrations by Quentin Crisp and published by Allen and Unwin in 1946 with its unclipped dust jacket. The book has 75 pages of text including the illustrations and is bound in orange cloth with black titles on the spine. The jacket is an example of economy as the inside shows part of a map of North Africa. 

The Bookroom 

Unique commemorative album to be presented to the London based “Arts Club” on Dover Street, Mayfair, by 30 Belgian World War I refugee artists
1/5
Fahrenheit 451 Antiquarian Booksellers

Unique commemorative album to be presented to the London based “Arts Club” on Dover Street, Mayfair, by 30 Belgian World War I refugee artists

The New Temple Shakespeare
2/5
Quair Books

The New Temple Shakespeare

O G and other Ogres by Reginald Reynolds
3/5
The Bookroom

O G and other Ogres by Reginald Reynolds

Mr. Papingay’s Ship by Marion St. John Webb
4/5
Peakirk Books

Mr. Papingay’s Ship by Marion St. John Webb

The Wit's Magazine; or Library of Momus. Being a Compleat Repository of Mirth, Humour, and Entertainment
5/5
Westfield Books

The Wit's Magazine; or Library of Momus. Being a Compleat Repository of Mirth, Humour, and Entertainment

* Mr. Papingay’s Ship by Marion St. John Webb

Large 8vo hardback book in bright unfaded orange cloth covers with black lettering to spine. Good clean pages, with just a very small amount of species of foxing to blocked page foredges. Fep has a printed Sunny stories prize sticker from Enid Blyton. The book contains 36 illustrations by Robin, done in the black and white line drawing style. 

Peakirk Books 

* The Wit's Magazine; or Library of Momus. Being a Compleat Repository of Mirth, Humour, and Entertainment
 
16 monthly issues, each with folding plate (one lacking, some worn with old repairs). Five plates engraved by Blake, one after Stothard and four after Samuel Collings. The only caricature prints engraved by Blake. Contributions by Samuel Butler. Rare.

Westfield Books