Rare books from GN Books and Prints

Highways and Byways in Devon and Cornwall by Arthur H. Norway, with illustrations by Josh Pennell and Hugh Thomson/Hardback, 1907, fifth reprint (originally published 1897) numerous illustrations and foldout map to rear, published by Macmillan & Co., Limited, London, 391 pages + viii.Octavo/8vo. Measures around 8" by 5 3/4" by 1 1/4". Green soft leather binding, gilt edging and detail to boards, gilt college crest to front board, red leather label and gilt lettering and extensive detail to spine. Some scuffing, a little marking, small signs of shelf-wear but overall colouring of leather and gilt detail very vivid apart from rubbing to small part of crest on front board. Binding firm. Corners slightly bumped. Book fans out a little towards outer edges, slight curvature to boards. Page edges and endpapers have attractive marbling. College prizegiving bookplate to front pastedown. Page surfaces clean, slight marking and occasional minor foxing but otherwise fine and no underlining, marginalia, etc. See… Read More

Le Cahier Jaune: Poems by Arthur Christopher Benson of Eton CollegePaperback/booklet, 1892, first edition, privately printed, limited, numbered 163 of 200, 99 pages.A somewhat worn but scarce copy of this limited private printing of the author's first collection of poems. Tattering, creasing, tearing and chipping to covers, spine and preliminaries. Crude tape repair to inside of front cover, with marking on title page. Slightly dog-eared corners to some pages. Binding strained, though contents all present and intact. Despite the tattered covers and outer pages, inner contents between the preliminaries and hindmost pages in rather good condition, very clean, only the occasional mark and with little wear other than at their very edges. See pictures for further information.Biographical information about the author from The Famous People website:Arthur Christopher Benson was an accomplished English author, poet and essayist. A number of his ghost stories have also been published along with stories of the… Read More

The Brotherhood of the Coast by David Lawson Johnstone with Twenty-One Illustrations by W. Boucher.
Hardback, 1895, first edition, published by W. & R. Chambers, Limited, London and Edinburgh, 411 pages with 32-page publisher catalogue at rear.
Octavo/8vo, measures around 7 5/8" by 5 5/8" by 1 3/4". No dust jacket. Red cloth binding with pictorial detail to front board and spine, black and red lettering with a little gilt lettering to spine, black and yellow detail, black emblem to rear board. Some marking and scuffing to binding, main red colouring still vivid, though some scuffing and fading to the pictorial detail and lettering. Signs of wear, rubbing at edges and a little on hinges, bumped corners. Book has slight forward tilt. Slackness to binding, cracking to inner hinges and some strain to textblock throughout, though intact and pages all present. Page edge groupings a little uneven, edges browned, scuffed and a bit marked. Some marking to endpapers, school prize-giving bookplate dating from… Read More

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
Hardback, 1910, with black and white frontispiece, published by Ward, Lock & Co., Limited, London, 317 pages. Scarce pictorial floral decoration binding.
Octavo/8vo, measures around 7 5/8" by 5 1/4" by 3/4". Dark green cloth binding with pictorial floral decoration to front board and spine, gilt lettering to front board and spine. Some marking and scuffing to binding but reasonably clean and colouring and detail still quite vivid, though a little more fading to floral detail on spine. Signs of wear, rubbing and slight tearing at edges, bumped corners. Some slackness to binding but book contents reasonably firm. Page edges browned, scuffed, a bit marked and slightly foxed. Pictorial floral endpapers reflecting front board design, tanning to preliminaries and hindmost pages marking to endpapers. School prize-giving bookplate to front board. Some marking and foxing, a little thumbing and staining to page surfaces but no underlining, marginalia, etc. See pictures for… Read More

Guide to Modern Japanese Woodblock Prints: 1900-1975 by Helen Merritt and Nanako Yamada Paperback, 1995, third print, published by University of Hawaii Press, x + 366 pages. Some scuffing to dust jacket, minor marking but quite clean. Slight edge-wear, a little creasing to corners. Damp staining to upper ends of first 70-ish pages, which has puckered them and the top edge of the front cover a little but they are not heavily marked. A little marking to bottom edges of pages. Fore-edges very clean. Page surfaces generally clean, no inscriptions, marginalia, underlining, etc. See pictures for more information.