Rare Book Sells at Auction for $2.5 Million

One of eight known copies of William Blake’s “The First Book of Urizen,” a volume so rare one professor spent 35 years looking for it, sold at Sotheby’s auction house Friday for $2.5 million.

It was thought to be the highest price ever paid for a piece of English literature, said Selby Kiffer, Sotheby’s senior vice president. The book was initially expected to sell for no more than $700,000.

The volume was sold to an anonymous bidder.

Blake’s book, printed in 1794, was part of socialite Betsey Cushing Whitney’s estate, which is being auctioned off at Sotheby’s through Sunday.

The edition’s 24 color etchings by Blake are what make it so unusual. They include powerful images of a man surrounded by flames and another in shackles, and were each printed from a single copper plate Blake painted.

“Each page has a picture,” said Jerry Bentley, a leading Blake scholar. “It is a very, very beautiful book.”

Bentley began looking for the book in 1963, phoning anyone who might have inherited it. He also searched through the desks of its former owner in case the rare find had been overlooked.

At Friday’s auction, several parties shared the professor’s enthusiasm enough to stay in the bidding war well past the $1-million mark, something that Kiffer said was unusual in itself. Bentley did not bid for the book.

Other items included a collection of letters sent by Oscar Wilde to Helena “Nellie” Sickerts, the sister of artist Walter Richard Sickerts. They sold to an anonymous bidder for $51,750.

Another set of letters from Claude Monet to his wife, Alice, sold for $21,850. A fragment of Thomas Wolfe’s manuscript for “Look Homeward, Angel” went for $79,500.