Available Copies from Independent Booksellers
Price: US$179.95 + shipping
Condition: Good
Description: Entire Volume VI, binding copy, marbled front board detached but present, rear board missing, spine leather missing, first and final few pages brittle and chipped, NOT affecting the Verne piece, a great candidate for the binder. This is the first appearance in English of parts of the author's first novel, a few pages excerpted from the book of the same title that would be published by D. Appleton, NY, 1869, after having been published multiple times in France beginning in 1863. Verne, who was relatively unknown in the English - speaking literary world, was misidentified by the editors of the present piece as "M. Jules Berne." It is generally believed the editors thought this piece was non-fiction. From the editor's preface, "I must begin by stating that I cannot guarantee the authenticity of the following remarkable adventures. I merely repeat them here, confiding in the good faith of one M. Jules Berne. The Frenchmen, who, it is notorious, are much better up in aeronautics than ourselves, modestly leave the merit of the five weeks' balloon trip across Africa to the English." Very scarce, and ready for restoration.
Seller: Legacy Books II, Louisville, KY, U.S.A.
Price: US$1650.00 + shipping
Condition: Good
Description: Boston: Fields & Osgood, 1868 [hardbound Volume 6, July to December 1868 of the magazine]. Taves & Michaluk V001. 10.25" x 6.75", 828 pp. Ex-Tacoma Public Library; half black calf with marbled paper boards. Quite scuffed, particularly at the corners and hinges. Pages are age toned, some are wrinkled, one page is torn but complete [not a page within the Verne issue]. Strongly bound. Somewhat worn (see scans) but still quite strong, better than Good, just short of very good by reason of one or two too many scuffs. Fascinating and quite rare Jules Verne English-language first/first. Just a few pages buried within this hefty collection of six months of Every Saturday: A Journal of Choice Reading - a Fields & Osgood double-column weekly issue - treat Verne's first novel, Five Weeks in a Balloon. At the time, the magazine editors were apparently of the opinion that Verne [who was then largely unknown to the American public] was describing actual events, rather than fictitious ones, in his tale of African adventures undertaken via the vehicle of a hot-air balloon. Here, in the five pages of this first appearance (see scan of the first one), only certain passages of the novel occur, along with a synopsis by the apparently intrigued editor, who concludes with the line: "All I can say is, that it was shameful of our newspapers, which profess to record everything that passes, to treat this important event with such utter silence." Verne is even mis-identified by the flummoxed staff, who refer to him as "M. Jules Berne." For this title, this piece is exceeded in English-language rarity only by its own softbound variant - i.e., the same piece not bound together in six-monthly tomes such as this, which was the habit of the era, which few have presumably largely perished. Taves & Michaluk at V001 note that "The London" sourcing reference for the Verne article remains unknown. See all scans. L53n
Seller: Singularity Rare & Fine, Baldwinsville, NY, U.S.A.