The best visual record of Saint-Petersburg in colour
To celebrate spring and the upcoming white nights in Peter the Great’s city, here is a remarkable work : Mornay’s A Picture of St. Petersburg, a folio with 20 full-page plates fully hand-coloured. The size of the plates, their quantity, their fine aquatint technique and their subtle watercolour consecrated this book as the most impressive coloured record of Russia’s Northern Capital ever published – and never surpassed. The work appeared in London at a very interesting time: in 1815, in the wake of the Napoleonic wars, when victorious Russia attracted praise and glory, and became the object of positive curiosity. We wrote up a full description of our copy, available at £ 17,500. Please inquire! |
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PY Rare Books is now in the heart of Mayfair! You can find our office on: 28 Bruton Street LONDON W1J 6QW This is 50 meters from Berkeley Square. See map here. Please drop us a line and we will be happy to show you our premises - and its treasures! |
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Old books...new ideas
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I'm no great fan of novelty for the sake of it. However sometimes innovation brings efficiency AND beauty, and when it's paired with great craftsmanship, results can be fantastic! Here is an example from the world of rare and valuable, but thin books. How can we dress them properly, so that they look the par? Here is a beautiful solution: a slipcase entirely made of wood! And a warm, glittering one: red cedar, with elegant gilt lettering to the spine. Housing my copy of the very rare first issue of the first edition of Solzhenitsyn's first published book, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich. |
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OLDER NEWS...
A busy year that was!
Lots have been happening in 2018! We've been busy finding great titles around the world, and summer arrives at the right moment to focus on processing all these purchases, some amazing, some, hum, not that clever, most pretty exciting!
Dealing was active too, with themes and items as varied as Russian Americana, a fantastic example of the first illustrated edition of Krylov's famous fables, Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, Russian émigré community in China, and art, such as these imposing, and contrasting (!) Portraits by Sorine, a copy signed by the artist.
Now onto the new season, after an exceptionnally hot London summer! Working on a few projects, including a selection of very attractive and uncommon children books, as well as a collection of works on the Caucasus. Soon on this page!
Lots have been happening in 2018! We've been busy finding great titles around the world, and summer arrives at the right moment to focus on processing all these purchases, some amazing, some, hum, not that clever, most pretty exciting!
Dealing was active too, with themes and items as varied as Russian Americana, a fantastic example of the first illustrated edition of Krylov's famous fables, Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, Russian émigré community in China, and art, such as these imposing, and contrasting (!) Portraits by Sorine, a copy signed by the artist.
Now onto the new season, after an exceptionnally hot London summer! Working on a few projects, including a selection of very attractive and uncommon children books, as well as a collection of works on the Caucasus. Soon on this page!
New acquisition! The greatest forerunner of Orwell's famous 1984
This is the cover of "My" ("We"), Evgeniy Zamyatin's celebrated (but still, to my mind, underrated) fantastic novel. Zamyatin describes a striking totalitarian world, which Orwell will expand in his masterpiece "Nineteen Eighty-Four". Written in 1920-21, it was unsurprisingly impossible to publish in USSR, and this first edition in Russian appeared some 32 years later, in New York, 15 years after Zamyatin's death, and just a year before Stalin's own.
This is the cover of "My" ("We"), Evgeniy Zamyatin's celebrated (but still, to my mind, underrated) fantastic novel. Zamyatin describes a striking totalitarian world, which Orwell will expand in his masterpiece "Nineteen Eighty-Four". Written in 1920-21, it was unsurprisingly impossible to publish in USSR, and this first edition in Russian appeared some 32 years later, in New York, 15 years after Zamyatin's death, and just a year before Stalin's own.
Next step: San Francisco!!
For the first time on the West Coast of America, we'll bring to the San Francisco Antiquarian Book, Print & Paper Fair a selection of rare 19th-century Russian publications on America and on the Pacific exploration, as well as a few 20th-c. artistic and literary gems. Then onto the ILAB Congress!
For the first time on the West Coast of America, we'll bring to the San Francisco Antiquarian Book, Print & Paper Fair a selection of rare 19th-century Russian publications on America and on the Pacific exploration, as well as a few 20th-c. artistic and literary gems. Then onto the ILAB Congress!
Sold! A letter by Catherine the Great...
....written just after the death of her lover Prince Potemkin, showing how involved she was in all details of the organisation of "New Russia", the recently conquered territories in nowadays Ukraine.
....written just after the death of her lover Prince Potemkin, showing how involved she was in all details of the organisation of "New Russia", the recently conquered territories in nowadays Ukraine.
Sold! A first edition of Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov....
....in one of the finest copies we've seen! A typical Russian contemporary half-calf binding, in very good condition although just a bit faded - the pages though were beautifully fresh, and without any of the usual issues that Russian books, especially literary, suffer too often: erased stamps, pages supplied, or stained, or shorter... This example was stunning, and we are happy to know it is well looked after now in a private collection!
....in one of the finest copies we've seen! A typical Russian contemporary half-calf binding, in very good condition although just a bit faded - the pages though were beautifully fresh, and without any of the usual issues that Russian books, especially literary, suffer too often: erased stamps, pages supplied, or stained, or shorter... This example was stunning, and we are happy to know it is well looked after now in a private collection!
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A not-so-recent TV interview of Pierre-Yves about rare Russian books and wine among other things - almost an hour long in Russian!
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