London: George Routledge and Sons, 1874. Small quarto. First printing of this edition. First published in 1842 by Rudolph Ackerman in London. Thirty-five color illustrations by Henry Alken, all present. One page of ads at the rear. Marbled boards in half-bound red morocco leather, compartments, titles and designs all gilt...
London: Hogarth Press, 1938. First Edition. An especially sharp copy, Fine and unread in a bright, fresh, very nearly Fine dust jacket. Jacket has a couple of tiny nicks at the crown, and just a hint of foxing at the front and rear panels, but with none of the toning...
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1930. First Edition, first printing of the author's second novel, the second book appearance of the Continental Op. About Good lacking the dust jacket. Binding square, but with soiling and some spotting/staining to the boards; fore-edges chipped on a few pages, and droplet stains on a....
N.p. N.p., 1982. Vintage double weight photograph of artist Joseph Beuys, shot in 1982 by photographer Klaus Behr. With Behr's stamp on the verso. At this time Beuys was approaching the height of long delayed recognition on an international level. The Guggenheim Museum held a major retrospective in 1979, ultimately...
N.p. N.p., 1979. Original arwork depicting exotic birds in a glorious psychedelic landscape, also known as Don Van Vliet's mind. Signed "Van Vliet / 79." From the collection of Beefheart guitarist Gary Lucas, for whom the painting was made. It was around this time that Van Vliet famously began to...
Beverly Hills, CA: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer [MGM], 1977. Final Draft script for the November 7, 1977 television episode, "The Crypt," season 1, episode 7 of the science fiction series "Logan's Run." This episode is based on an original story by Harlan Ellison. Copy belonging to an uncredited crew member named Chuck Sereci...
Mexico: Era, 1966. First Mexican Edition, preceded by 1962 Madrid edition, but the first printing of the text as Garcia Marquez originally intended. One of just 2,000 copies, and much scarcer than the 1962 Madrid edition of which 5,000 copies were printed. In an author's note to this edition, Gracia...
New York: Boni and Liveright, 1926 [1925]. Hardcover. Thirteenth printing, published in May 1926 (first printing having been published in November 1925). INSCRIBED by Anita Loos to director George Cukor on the front endpaper some years later: "April 7, 1954 / So now after 25 years you want my autograph!...
(read more)about Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (Hardcover, inscribed by Anita Loos to George Cukor
Mexico City: Ultramar Films, 1952. Draft script for the 1954 Mexican film. Included is a typed letter signed from the film's producer Edward L. Alperson, on his custom rough-edged stationery, discussing the possibility of distribution within the US. Distribution was eventually taken on by United Artists, and Daniel O'Herlihy received...
New York: Hearst Magazines, 1949. The first appearance of the novel, in an abridged pre-publication format, preceding the version published by Hamish Hamilton in the UK later the same year, and the US edition, published just after that. Chandler's fifth novel, written after several years working as a screenwriter, and dripping...
(read more)about The Little Sister in Cosmopolitan, April 1949
Neuilly-sur-Seine, France: Gaumont, 1916. Vintage double weight matte finish still photograph from the legendary 1916 silent film serial. With the Gaumont logo at the lower right corner. The last of Feuillade's three film serial masterpieces, preceded by "Fantomas" (1913) and "Les Vampires" (1915), combining elements of both its predecessors. In...
New York: E .P. Dutton, 1972. First Edition. Humorously INSCRIBED by avant garde composer and former Black Mountain faculty member John Cage on the front flyleaf: "This is a book I haven't read. / John Cage." A history of Black Mountain College, the experimental college located in North Carolina that...
(read more)about Black Mountain: An Exploration in Community
N.p. N.p., 1973. Vintage borderless oversize candid photograph of Jane Birkin by her best known photographer Jean-Pierre Fizet. Here she lounges poolside, wearing more than usual (i.e., a hat). With Fizet's rubber stamp and multiple agency stamps on the verso, along with a date of 1973. 11 x 8.5 inches. Very...
(read more)about Original photograph of Jane Birkin lounging poolside, 1973
Atelier 41 / New World Pictures, 1975. Original Polish poster for the 1975 film, designed by B. Tankowska. Director Akira Kurosawa had long been a fan of V.K. Arsenyev's nonfiction account of his travels in the Ussuri basin in the Russian Far East, during which Arsenyev encountered and befriended a....
Burbank, CA: Warner Brothers, 1942. Draft script for the 1942 film. Actor Van Heflin's copy. A 1942 film musical with a somewhat controversial trajectory. Seven years after its release, Hungarian playwright and concentration camp survivor Ferenc Herczeg sued MGM for plagiarizing his 1903 play, "Seven Sisters." Paramount legally adapted the...
Stockholm: Svensk Filmindustri (SF), 1970. Vintage black-and-white borderless double weight Swedish press photograph from the 1971 film, shot in 1970. Stamps on the verso for the Pressens Bild Ab Feature-Service in Sweden, as well as a Swedish mimeo snipe describing the scene, dated October 1970 and crediting still photographer Jorgen...
Phoenix, AZ: Border House, 1971. First Edition, with the pictorial marijuana leaf design box top (replaced later with a white box top). Complete, with playing pieces, fake money, cards, and scoring pad in the original, unopened plastic bag. Rare, with no copies in OCLC. A Monopoly-esque game where players compete...
(read more)about Beat the Border: The Game of Narcotics Traffic
New York: Magic Lantern Inc, 1971. Draft script for the 1974 film. Based on the 1927 novel by Hermann Hesse. A depressed half-man half-animal (played by Max von Sydow) is introduced to the hallucinogenic world of the "Magic Theater," where he seeks redemption via a metaphysical transcendence. The film took...
(read more)about Steppenwolf [Hermann Hesse's Steppenwolf...For Madmen Only
Los Angeles: Twentieth Century-Fox, 1989. Shooting script for the 1990 film. With rainbow revision pages throughout. Sequel to the 1988 action thriller, based on the unrelated 1987 novel "58 Minutes" by Walter Wager. Two years after the Nakatomi Tower incident, hard-nosed cop John McClane returns to save Dulles International Airport from...
Paris: Productions Sigma, 1939. Vintage double weight photograph from the 1939 film. Shot and struck by the film's still photographer Raymond Voinquel, with his name in tiny print at the bottom left corner of the image, and the film title at the bottom right. A striking image, shot from the...
Germany: Filmverleih Die Lupe GmbH, 1960. German poster for the original release of the legendary 1960 jazz documentary, set at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival in Rhode Island, shot in high style by commercial and fashion photographer Bert Stern. In addition to the iconic figures noted on the poster, the...
(read more)about Stern: Jazz an einem Sommerabend [Jazz on a Summer's Day
N.p. N.p., Circa 1970s. Original typescript screenplay for an unproduced film called "After the Fall," based on Arthur Miller's 1964 play about a Jewish intellectual living in New York. Miller's play opened on Broadway in 1964, at the ANTA Washington Square Theatre, ran for 208 performances, and closed on May...
Universal City, CA: Universal Pictures, 1941. Draft script for the 1941 film, here under the working title "The Great Man", with holograph annotations on nearly every page. W.C. Fields' last starring film before his death in 1946. Told as a "real life" film starring Fields as himself, "Never Give a....
(read more)about Never Give a Sucker an Even Break [The Great Man
![Appointment in Samarra] Archive of scripts from five episodes of the television series...](http://www.royalbooks.com/pictures/thumb/130063.jpg?v=1418080671)
Burbank, CA: National Broadcasting Company [NBC], 1976. Final and Revised Final drafts for four episodes the 1976 season and two episodes 1977 season of the NBC television series "Gibbsville," based on characters in John O'Hara's 1934 novel, "Appointment in Samarra." Gibbsville is the name of the town central to the...
Tokyo: Toho Company, 1960. Draft script for the 1960 Japanese film. Holograph ink and stamp on the outer page edges. Production designer's script, with holograph underlining on numerous pages regarding objects needed for a given scene (swimsuits, sun cream, summer kimonos, Persian cat, etc.) Other annotations, in the same hand...
N.p. N.p., 1937. Draft script for the 1937 film. Character of Mary Field, with the actress' name, Suzanne Kaaren (uncredited in the final film), written in, at the bottom of the cast list on the "CAST" page, with a few pages with minor proofreading emendations in holograph pencil. Screenplay divided...
Berlin: Jovis Verlag / Arte Editions, 2002. First Edition. SIGNED by Werner Herzog on the title page. A wonderful compendium of still photographs in both color and black-and-white, taken over the years on the sets of Werner Herzog's films. With text throughout in English, French, and German by Herzog and...
Beverly Hills, CA: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer [MGM], 1924. Continuity Draft script for the 1925 film. Studio File Copy, rubber-stamped on the front wrapper. Brief notation on one page in holograph pencil. Based on Tod Robbins' 1917 novel, a classic of horror fiction about a trio of circus freaks who escape captivity in...
Rome: Albert and Charles Boni, 1951. Original Italian program for the 1951 film, based on the novel "Toto il buono" by Cesare Zavattini. SIGNED by De Sica at the bottom of the title page. One of the director's classics, pure visual storytelling, made just after "Bicycle Thieves" (1948) and just...
Universal City, CA: Universal Pictures, 1968. Second Revised Final script for the 1970 film. A Cold War-era science fiction film in the vein of Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove," in which US and USSR supercomputers join forces to create either world peace or, if crossed, world destruction. When cast, actor Eric Braeden...
Studio City, CA: EMI Television Programs, Inc., 1976. Two Revised draft scripts, Part I and Part II, comprising the complete script, for the 1977 television film, which was broadcast in two parts on CBS on April 13 and 14, 1977. First script, titled "Howard: The Amazing Mr. Hughes" on front wrapper...
(read more)about The Amazing Howard Hughes [Howard: The Amazing Mr. Hughes
London: Vic Films / Governor Films, 1962. Final British Script for the 1962 film, based on the 1960 novel. Along with "Billy Liar" (1963), which he would make the following year, John Schlesinger's first feature film is perhaps the quintessential document of middle-class life in Northern England during the early...
London: Hammer Films, 1971. Revised Draft script for the 1972 British horror film, here under the working title "Blood Will Have Blood." With holograph annotations throughout that include additions to description and changes in dialogue. A classic from the Hammer canon, and the last film Hammer made in conjunction with...
New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1940. First American Edition. Fine and unread in a Fine dust jacket. A spectacular copy. Lord Peter Wimsey.
Tokyo: Toei, 1969. Draft script for the 1969 film. Text in Japanese. With annotations throughout in holograph pencil. High demand for tattooed geishas come in from Europe, leading to a formidable production line of ladies receiving tattoos in order to please European men. White titled perfect bound wrappers. Title page...
(read more)about Inferno of Torture [Tattoo Generation, Hell's Tattooers
Culver City, CA: Tri-Star [TriStar] Pictures, 1984. Revised Final script and shooting schedule for the 1984 film. Copy belonging to an uncredited crew member, with his holograph annotations throughout in blue ink. Doc Jenkins (Willie Nelson) is an aspiring singer/songwriter whose ambition is thwarted by a bad contract with a....