Search Results: Titles starting with G from Honey & Wax Booksellers

Berlin: S. Fischer Verlag, 1932. First edition of German novelist Alfred Döblin's Giganten, inscribed by Döblin to the Russian-Jewish political writer Isaac Steinberg (1888-1957), from the library of Steinberg's son, art historian Leo Steinberg (1920-2011). While Döblin is best remembered for his 1929 realist novel Berlin Alexanderplatz, critical attention in recent years has turned to his ambitious, dystopian works of science fiction. Giganten is a revised and condensed version of Döblin's 1924 Berge Meere und Giganten, adapted in an effort to find his sprawling eco-horror novel a broader audience. Döblin's vision of a precarious global future characterized by energy crises, relentless genetic engineering, and environmental catastrophe now seems prescient. The unabridged 1924 text was finally translated into English as Mountains Oceans Giants in 2021. Döblin has inscribed this copy of Giganten to his friend Isaac Steinberg, a Russian exile, Socialist Revolutionary, and leader of the Jewish… Read More

(London): Hodder & Stoughton, 1934. First English edition of James Hilton's tale of the shy schoolmaster Mr. Chipping, who over the course of a long career becomes a legend at Brookfield, "a good school of the second rank." Deeply Victorian in sympathy, "Mr. Chips" rises to the challenge of the First World War, and survives into the 1930s, beloved by generations of boys: "In my mind you never grow up at all. Never." Originally issued as a supplement to The British Weekly in 1933, Goodbye, Mr. Chips was reprinted in The Atlantic in April 1934, followed by book publication in the United States in June and England in October; the nostalgic novel was a runaway bestseller during the Depression, inspiring the Oscar-winning 1939 Hollywood film starring Robert Donat. This first English edition is wonderfully illustrated by Ethel "Bip" Pares, one of England's leading Art Deco book designers. Accompanied by two typed letters written and signed by Hilton, during his stint as a Hollywood screenwriter, to… Read More

Tokyo: Wunternaum Press, 1964. First edition of Yoko Ono's self-published first book, one of 500 stated copies (though likely fewer) printed, preceding the first trade edition by six years. This copy was inscribed by Ono at the March 10, 1966 opening of The Stone, the New York Fluxus group show in which she played a central role: "To Helen, / 1966, opening / Judson Church Gallery / NYC, NY / Yoko Ono." Grapefruit collects instructions for Ono's early conceptual art pieces, organized under the headings of Music, Painting, Event, Poetry, and Object. Some works can be enacted by readers, like Shadow Piece: "Put your shadows together until they become one." Others can be realized only in the imagination. The directions for Clock Piece read: "Make all the clocks in the world fast by two seconds without letting anyone know about it." Wind Piece instructs: "Blow hats all over the city." Fly Piece demands of the artist: "Fly." Ono inscribed this copy at the opening of The Stone, the 1966 Fluxus performance… Read More

Brooklyn: Green-Wood Cemetery, 1882. Nineteenth-century walking guide to Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, founded in 1838, one of the first planned green spaces in New York City. The gilt-stamped upper board depicts the landmark brownstone Gothic Revival gate at the main entrance to the cemetery. "Objects of Special Interest" include the Firemen's Monument, the Civil War Soldiers' Monument, and the Brooklyn Theatre Fire Monument, as well as the tombs of prominent New Yorkers, among them governor DeWitt Clinton, publisher Horace Greeley, and Broadway impresario William "Billy" Niblo, who hosted parties at his Green-Wood mausoleum before he died. Although the lithographer is not credited, this is a variant of the Snyder & Black Green-Wood map, in continual use since the 1850s. A near-fine example, in splendid mauve cloth boards. Lithographed map, measuring 23.75 x 15.75 inches unfolded, housed in original mauve pictorial cloth boards, stamped and lettered in gilt, measuring 6.75 x 4.75 inches.… Read More