Booksellers Are Wise to the Value of a Little Dust on the Jacket

Thanks to the film version of “The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring,” author J.R.R. Tolkien is hotter now among book collectors than at any time since his “Rings” trilogy was first published in the ‘50s. This leads antiquarian bookseller David Brass to deadpan, “We’d be very happy if Hollywood would make a 15-part miniseries of John Galsworthy.”

A little book humor there. It seems that Galsworthy, his 1932 Nobel Prize in literature notwithstanding, is off the radar with collectors, although, Brass said, “We can still sell a fine copy of ‘The Forsyte Saga.’”

Poor Galsworthy, who died in 1933, is in good company. Among other writers who have been relegated to “you collect whose works?” status are California’s William Saroyan (“The Human Comedy”), William Thackeray and Aldous Huxley. Fame, it seems, does not guarantee collectibility.

In the ‘20s, says Mike Hime, co-proprietor with his daughter, Jennefer, of Biblioctopus in Beverly Hills, “Dickens was the most collected, but Thackeray was a close second. Today, no one collects Thackeray, except maybe ‘Vanity Fair.’” As for Huxley? Pretty much a washout among collectors, save for a first edition of “Brave New World.”

Among the “ins,” not surprisingly, is J.K. Rowling, with her phenomenally successful Harry Potter books. If you happen to have one of the 300 first editions of the first volume as it was originally published in England, “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone,” and it’s in A-1 shape and with its dust jacket, think $20,000.

In truth, says Benjamin Weinstein, co-owner of Heritage Book Shop, a haven for antiquarian collectors that occupies a richly appointed former mortuary on Melrose Avenue, “Most books have no value.” And the few that do usually are first editions of the most popular works by the most enduringly popular authors.

In that category: Mark Twain’s “Huckleberry Finn,” J.D. Salinger’s “Catcher in the Rye,” Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter,” Daniel Defoe’s “Robinson Crusoe,” Jonathan Swift’s “Gulliver’s Travels,” Henry Fielding’s “Tom Jones,” Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” and John Steinbeck’s “The Grapes of Wrath.” Any of these may easily fetch five figures.

More than 200 antiquarian booksellers--who deal in collectible books, manuscripts, autographs, maps, prints and graphics--from throughout the United States and Europe will offer their wares at the 35th California International Antiquarian Book Fair today through Sunday at Airport Marriott Hotel.

Recognizing the current interest in Rowling and Tolkien, there will be a special exhibit of fantasy literature. And the antiquarians will take a bold step into the 20th century (don’t rush them) with computer terminals to guide visitors to their favorite title or author.

Brass, who in addition to being the vice president of Heritage Bookshop also chairs the area chapter of the Antiquarian Booksellers Assn. of America, promises a variety of offerings in the $100-and-up category for entry-level collectors. At the top end are a collection of 70 handwritten essays by Ayn Rand for $500,000, a first edition of Sir Thomas Moore’s “Utopia” for $550,000 and a 1623 first folio edition of “Mr. William Shakespeare’s Comedies, Histories and Tragedies” for $650,000.

Antiquarian book collectors are nothing if not eclectic. There will be books on subjects ranging from American Indians to cookery to gay literature to Judaica to the Middle East to avant-garde Russian art.

Among those expected to attend is Nicholas Basbanes, a collector who has chronicled the lives of book collectors and booksellers in two books of his own, “A Gentle Madness: Bibliophiles, Bibliomanes and the Eternal Passion for Books” (Henry Holt) and “Patience & Fortitude: A Roving Chronicle of Book People, Book Places and Book Culture” (HarperCollins).

In a telephone interview from his Massachusetts home, Basbanes, by his own admission one of the “gently mad”--he has more than 10,000 volumes stuffed into every nook and cranny of his house--told of one of the more notable collectors, Stephen Blumberg, a well-off Iowan who had a somewhat unorthodox method of acquisition.

Blumberg, he said, was “the most notorious book thief of the 20th century. He took 22,000 books from 368 libraries in 45 states, Canada and the District of Columbia. He had a California Room in his house, where he kept his favorite pickings,” some of which were purloined from the Claremont Colleges and USC. “An example of a bibliophile who goes over the cliff, a cautionary tale,” said Basbanes. “If he was just another crook, stealing for greed and profit, I wouldn’t have been interested in him, but he was a collector,” with a particular interest in American Victoriana. Blumberg landed in prison and, happily, most of those books landed back in their libraries.

A “borderline bibliomane” himself, Basbanes has trouble explaining the thrill of the hunt, but knows that “every time you pick up a wonderful, beautiful book, something magical happens. Either you have this disease or you don’t.”

Among eccentric collectors he has uncovered are a man who collects “nutty books,” such as those printed on pasta or shaped like an accordion, and a Midwesterner who set out to “get every copy of ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’ in every edition.” He found more than 1,000, and when he found no Yiddish edition, he commissioned one. He has pledged his collection to Cornell University.

“A true collector,” Basbanes says, “is also a scholar. Every collection is more than just a gathering of books. A collector is really a storyteller and to become a storyteller you have to connect the dots. Otherwise, it’s just an accumulation of objects.” Among scholar-collectors he names L.A. arts patron Louise Taper as “arguably the finest private collector of Lincoln” books and artifacts.

For many, books are in the genes. Brass, born in England, is a fourth-generation antiquarian bookseller whose family traces its roots to an ancestor who had a bookstall in St. Paul’s churchyard in London in 1516. The Weinstein brothers, who founded the Heritage shop in 1963, have three siblings who own bookshops. Benjamin’s daughter, Rachel, 26, who is a children’s book specialist at Heritage, says, “I was raised in this business. I can’t imagine myself anywhere else.”

Once, an antiquarian book was, by definition, 100 or more years old. Today, it may be only a few years old. And not all collectibles are great literature. Heritage recently sold a first issue of Playboy, December 1953, with Marilyn Monroe as the centerfold, for $4,000.

A new generation may focus on a certain book or author and create a market. A generation ago, a first edition of Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road” in great condition might have brought $300; today, it would bring $5,000 or more. Price is also determined by the original supply. Among Ian Fleming’s Bond books, the most valuable is “Casino Royale,” in which the Bond character was introduced--a good first edition copy might bring $20,000. But “Octopussy” has little value, as so many were printed.

Your family Bible most likely is worthless on the collectibles market, says Louis Weinstein, adding that most of the shop’s query calls are about family Bibles. “Sadly, many people pay safe deposit fees for decades” to keep that Bible safe--then find out it’s worth $10.

While first editions are, with few exceptions, the ones of interest to collectors, “first edition in itself is not an indication of value,” says Louis Weinstein. “Ninety-nine percent of authors aren’t collectible.” Condition of a book is all-important--and the fewer restorations the better.

Oddities, such as typographical errors corrected in later editions, may add to value. Author autographs add value if the author, like Tolkien and Kerouac, gave few. Others, like Joyce Carol Oates, have autographed with such abandon that their signatures don’t translate to money.

What’s known in the trade as “presentation copies” are highly desirable. That’s when the author inscribes a book as a gift to a friend. Heritage is offering a copy of “You Only Live Twice” signed by Fleming to the real James Bond “from the thief of his identity.” Brass explains that a man named James Bond was a noted ornithologist and that Fleming found his name in a bird book in his library and fancied it for his hero. Asking price: $75,000.

Hime is bringing to the fair from Biblioctopus a complete collection of the 22 books of Edgar Rice Burroughs, including a copy of “Son of Tarzan” inscribed to Burroughs’ son. Asking price for the set: $260,000.

On a more contemporary note, Hime is offering Paul McCartney’s handwritten working manuscript for the song “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” from the “Abbey Road” album for $145,000. Not a bad price, observes Hime, considering that the British Museum so esteems Beatles manuscripts that it has exhibited them right next to the Magna Carta.

If there hadn’t been rock ‘n’ roll, says Brass, the Beatles and other top rock stars of the ‘60s “would have been the great poets of that generation.” In their wisdom, they determined that by setting their poetry to music they wouldn’t wind up as starving poets.

Having paid thousands of dollars for a coveted book, does a collector stash it away in a safe deposit box or display it in a theft-proof cabinet?

Not really. Most just stick their treasures on their bookshelves. As Himes points out, “A thief is more likely to take your $300 VCR than your $20,000 copy of ‘A Christmas Carol.’”

The 35th California International Antiquarian Book Fair will be held 2-9 p.m. today, 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Saturday and 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Sunday at Airport Marriott Hotel, 5855 W. Century Blvd. Admission is $5, with a three-day pass being offered today for $10.