Huge Lewis Carroll and Alice in Wonderland Collection to Auction

Potter & Potter's auction Lewis Carroll and Alice: The Collection of Stephen and Nancy Farber focuses on a collection put together over four decades of books, illustrations, sketches, posters, posters, and art related to Lewis Carroll's books and characters.

The top lot in this sale on November 30 is #2, a signed, first authorized edition, and first published English edition of Lewis Carroll's Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. It carries a presale auction estimate of $30,000-50,000. This example was published in London by Macmillan and Co. in 1865 but dated 1866 for the Christmas market. It features 42 illustrations by John Tenniel. For this new edition, the book was re-set by the printer Richard Clay from a copy of the suppressed 1865 Alice, forming the basis for all future Macmillan editions. 

This presentation copy is inscribed by the author to Richard Doyle (1824-1883) on the half-title using his real name. This was rare as Dodgson was careful to protect his privacy and to prevent his serious mathematical works from being linked with his children's books. This lot also includes a first edition, first state of Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There. It was published in London by Macmillan and Co., in 1871 but dated 1872. It includes illustrations by John Tenniel and a publisher’s ad for Dodgson’s works on the frontispiece.

Other highlights include:

* Lot #3, a first authorized edition and first published English edition of Carroll's Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, is estimated at $15,00-25,000. It was published in London by Macmillan and Co., in 1865 but dated 1866. This unique presentation copy, inscribed by the illustrator John Tenniel, includes an original drawing on the half-title of the Mad Hatter with a tea cup and toast. It is signed, “With [monogram] JT’s kind regards / Xmas 1867”. This is one of only 5 known copies of drawings made by Tenniel as part of inscriptions in books, according to Schiller’s 1990 census.

* Lot #83, the "original Alice's copy" of Nabokov's Russian translation of Alice, is estimated at $10,000-15,000. It was published in Berlin by Izdatel’stov Gamayun in 1923. This rarity is signed in brown ink on the front pastedown by Alice P. Hargreaves (1852-1934), the “original Alice” and  features 12 illustrations by S.V. Zalshupin in the Russian Constructivist style. It includes its original folding cloth chemise and slipcase.