SAN FRANCISCO – On Oct. 6, PBA Galleries will offer a first printing of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. The 1961 Pulitzer Prize Award-winning book is inscribed and signed by the author and is in an unrestored dust jacket. The lot is accompanied by a letter from the author to the person who requested the signing of the book for his son. It is expected to sell for $20,000 to $30,000.
Absentee and Internet live bidding is available through LiveAuctioneers.com.
Up for auction will be over 450 lots of fine literature of the 19th and 20th centuries, including many significant titles and authors such as Cormac McCarthy, James Joyce, Dorothy Parker, Mark Twain, Zane Grey, Roald Dahl and Charles Bukowski.
PBA is also offering the Segur collection of books by Richard Brautigan, including his rare first books, several signed limited editions and a large number of other important works by the poet.
The first edition of the first published work by Richard Brautigan, The Return of the Rivers (below), is most assuredly the rarest piece of important Brautigan ephemera in existence. The poem was printed as a favor to Brautigan by Leslie Woolf Hedley of Inferno Press. Originally, one of 100 copies, it is now estimated that only 15 copies of the poem still exist. The estimate is $5,000-$8,000.
An extensive archive of John Updike material from Lord John Press, including correspondence, proofs, manuscripts and ephemera, in four leather binders, 16 manila envelopes and a cloth chemise will also be on the auction block. The lot contains well over 100 pieces of correspondence from Updike to Herb Yellin, proprietor of Lord John Press, dating from 1975-2005, including at least 60 full page letters on various sizes of stationary, and many more note cards and postcards, both typed and handwritten, all signed, many with original mailing envelopes. The decades of Updike’s correspondence to Yellin provide a fascinating and educational window into their literary partnership. Estimate: $10,000-$15,000.
Other featured lots in the literature section of the sale include an inscribed copy of Ernest Hemingway’s first novel The Torrents of Spring (below) signed in Cuba, 1955. From an edition of only 1,250 copies, the lot is in the illustrated dust jacket and housed in a brown leather and cloth clamshell box (est. $8,000-$12,000).
A rare first edition of one of the best-selling books of the 20th century, The Prophet, by Kahlil Gibran will also be offered (est. $8,000-$12,000). Lost Horizon, James Hilton’s novel of the fictional Tibetan utopia Shangri-La is also in the sale. Two letters are laid in this first edition, one from the publisher describing the binding and title page of the first edition (est. $8,000-$12,000).
Additional highlights in the sale are a set of the esteemed Winchester Edition of The Novels of Jane Austen, beautifully bound in three-quarter red morocco by Lauriat (est. $4,000-$7,000); a massive collection of over 150 volumes by Upton Sinclair with more than 20 signed or inscribed copies (est. $4,000-$6,000); and a fine copy of Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, the seminal novel of the Beat Generation (est: $3,000-$5,000).
The sale will begin at 11 a.m. Pacific Time and the public may preview the auction the week Oct. 3 at PBA Galleries in San Francisco. For details contact the galleries at 415-989-2665 or pba@pbagalleries.com.