Recent Arrivals from Chase Rare Books

London Almanack For The Year Of Christ 1818. Printed for the Company of stationers. Charming Regency miniature book (58×37mm) attractively bound wallet style in red leather with tongue flap to close. n.p. [13 leaves], all edges gilt. Pink endpapers and coin pocket at the back. The Almanack Explained - Under the title of every Month is the change of the Moon &… Read more about this item

CAPOTE, Truman. The Muses Are Heard. New York: Random House, 1956. 8vo, pp. 182. Very good in unclipped dust-jacket (minor wear to spine ends). Dust-jacket design by Philip Grushkin, with English lettering to front face, and Slavonic to the rear. First edition, first printing. Written in reportage style this book is a captivating and entertaining account of the cultural… Read more about this item

FRASER, Antonia. Marie Antoinette: The Journey. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2001. First edition. Signed by the author to title-page. Antonia Fraser's vivid and empathetic portrait of the French queen, whose dramatic story she attempts to tell 'without anticipating its terrible ending'. This book served as an inspiration for Sofia Coppola's 2006 film Marie Antoinette, starring Kirsten Dunst in the titular… Read more about this item

ARLEN, Michael; BEATON, Cecil (Illus.) A Young Man Comes to London: an original short story. London: Marshalsea Press, [c.1932] Arlen's story is accompanied by 3 pieces on the Dorchester Hotel: 'A Brief History of a New Enterprise' by Sir Francis Towle; 'An Architect's Problem – How it Was Solved' by Professor C.H. Reilly; and 'Some Facts and Figures about the Dorchester'… Read more about this item

TOLSTOY, Leo, Count. Anna Karenina. New York: Grosset & Dunlap, n.d. [c.1935]. Photoplay edition issued by Grosset & Dunlap to coincide with the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer release of the 1935 film adaptation of Tolstoy's novel, starring Greta Garbo in the leading role. Title from the publisher's Universal Library series. 8vo, original cloth, gilt lettering and design to spine. 1090 pp. Very good… Read more about this item

TREFUSIS, Violet. Pirates at Play. London: Michael Joseph, 1950. Third impression. Presentation copy, inscribed in French by the author to her friend, Marie Blanche [de Polignac]: 'Pour Marie Blanche, ces Borgia bourgeois, son amie, Violette'. Violet Trefusis (1894-1972) was a writer and a patron of the arts. She wrote novels (five in English, four in French), poems, essays, and plays. She is… Read more about this item

ZANUCK, Darryl Francis. Habit and other short stories. Los Angeles: Times-Mirror Press, 1923 First edition. When this book was published in 1923, Darryl Zanuck (1902-1979) was still a struggling writer – his legendary career as a movie mogul and Head of 20th Century-Fox, was still ahead of him. Habit is a four-story collection, including 'The Forgotten City', which in 1924 Zanuck… Read more about this item

SMITH, Ali. The Seasonal Quartet: Autumn, Winter, Spring, Summer [and] Companion Piece. London: Hamish Hamilton, 2016-2022. A complete set of Ali Smith's Seasonal Quartet, plus the Companion Piece, the follow up to the Quartet. All signed first editions, first impressions, except Autumn (5th printing; not signed). 5 volumes. 260, 322, 336, 384, 226 pp.8vo, original cloth, minor bumping to bottom corners of… Read more about this item

KAEL, Pauline. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. London: Calder & Boyars, 1970. First UK edition. Pauline Kael (1919-2001) was the most powerful and provocative American film critic of the twentieth century, credited with turning the movie review genre into an expressive art form. The brilliant title of this book, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, derives from an Italian movie poster, and it expresses… Read more about this item

BENJAMIN, Melanie. The Swans of Fifth Avenue. Delacorte Press, 2016 First edition, first printing. Signed. This is a novel about New York "swans" of the 1950s, and the scandalous, headline-making, and enthralling friendship between literary legend Truman Capote and peerless socialite Babe Paley. HB (ISBN: 9780345528698). 341 pp. Fine in fine dust jacket.

SCOTT, Peter; The Wildfowl Trust. The Swans. London: Michael Joseph, 1972. First edition. Signed by Peter Scott. Swans are fascinating birds, and this book is certainly a must-have on the subject. Chapters include Classification, Distribution and Migration, Family Life, Art, Heraldry and Mythology, Conservation, and more. Sir Peter Scott (1909-1989) was an artist, writer, ornithologist, naturalist and conservationist. In 1946 he founded… Read more about this item

VANDERBILT, Gloria and FURNESS, Lady Thelma. Double Exposure: A Twin Autobiography.David McKay Company: New York, 1958 Third Printing. From the library of Truman Capote, with his ownership initials on the front endpaper. Laid in is a Bonhams slip indicating that this was part of lot 1061 in "The Private World of Truman Capote" sale. This is the dual autobiography of the famous… Read more about this item

GREENBERG-JEPHCOTT, KELLEIGH. Swan Song. London, Hutchinson, 2018. Exclusive signed first edition, limited to 250 copies (this is copy #97/250). As new in strikingly stylish white swan dust jacket. Playlist loosely inserted. With original Marella Agnelli bookmark. Author's debut novel, an entertaining and spellbinding reimagining of one of the most fascinating literary scandals - the epic fall out between Truman Capote and… Read more about this item

GOUDEKET, Maurice. Close to Colette: An Intimate Portrait of a Woman of Genius. New York: Farrar, Straus and Cudahy, 1957. First edition. With an Introduction by Harold Nicolson. Dust jacket design by Milton Glaser. In this beautifully written book, Colette comes wonderfully alive - a woman as fascinating and courageous as any of the heroines of her famous novels. Maurice Goudeket met… Read more about this item

STOKER, Bram. Dracula. New York: Random House, n.d. [c. 1944]. Modern Library, 31. Early reprint of the Modern Library Dracula issued with dust jacket art by Edward McKnight Kauffer, (1890–1954), American artist, and one of Britain's most influential poster artists and graphic designers of his era. Since its publication in 1897, Dracula has enthralled generation after generation of readers, cinema and television… Read more about this item

AVEDON, Richard; CAPOTE, Truman. Observations. New York: Simon & Shuster, 1959. First edition. Photographs by Richard Avedon. Introductory essay 'On Richard Avedon', and text accompanying the photographs by Truman Capote. Book design by Alexey Brodovitch. The first collection of Avedon's photographs to appear in book form. Features some of the most fascinating figures of mid-twentieth century: Marilyn Monroe, Brigitte Bardot, Coco Chanel,… Read more about this item

AUSTEN, Jane. Mansfield Park. London: J.M. Dent & Co., 1908. Reprint of the fourth Dent edition (1906). Illustrated with colour plates by H.M. Brock. Edited by Reginald Brimley Johnson. Printed from the second edition (John Murray, 1816) of Mansfield Park. Complete in two volumes. Part of a 10-volume series collection of the novels of Jane Austen. Author's third novel, and the first… Read more about this item

RADZIWILL, Lee. Happy Times. New York: Assouline, 2000. First edition. Signed and inscribed by the author. Half notebook, half photo album, Happy Times, presents Lee Radziwill's reminiscences of the 1960s, a period of her life that was particularly rich and exciting. Rather than offering a chronological story, the book evokes people, places and moments, and takes us back to one of the… Read more about this item

DALTREY, Roger. Thanks a Lot Mr Kibblewhite: My Story. London: Blink Publishing, 2018. First edition, first printing. Signed to title-page. The Who frontman Roger Daltrey's autobiography. This is the story of My Generation, Tommy and Quadrophenia, of smashed guitars, exploding drums, cars in swimming pools, fights, arrests, and redecorated hotel rooms. Arguably one of the greatest rock singers to emerge from… Read more about this item

MITFORD, Jessica. Hons and Rebels. London: Victor Gollancz, 1960. First edition, first printing.Jessica "Decca" Mitford's classic memoir,with the scarce dust jacket. An entrancing account of growing up in an eccentric aristocratic family in an isolated country home in the Cotswolds during the 1920s and 30s. Jessica's Hons and Rebels, and the novel by her elder sister Nancy Mitford, The Pursuit of… Read more about this item