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WALTON, Izaak; RACKHAM, Arthur (illus.). The Compleat Angler: or the Contemplative Man's Recreations. Being a Discourse of Rivers, Fishponds, Fish and Fishing not unworthy the Perusal of most Anglers. George C. Harrap & Co. Ltd., London, 1931.

Price: US$100.00 + shipping

Condition: Good

Description: 223 p. 26 cm. Frontispiece and 11 other colour plates. B&w line drawings. Illustrated endpapers. Grey cloth with gold print. Small label on front pastedown. Corners bumped, spine faded, pencil marks and small scuff on rear. Ink signature on half title. Some foxing, mainly to first pages. First published in 1653 by London publisher Richard Marriot, The Compleat Angler is here illustrated by Arthur Rackham, perhaps the greatest illustrator of the 'Golden Age' of British book illustration.

Seller: Attic Books (ABAC, ILAB), London, ON, Canada

IZAAK WALTON ILLUSTRATED BY ARTHUR RACKHAM. THE COMPLEAT ANGLER. GEORGE C. HARRAP, LONDON, 1931.

Price: US$142.95 + shipping

Condition: Good

Description: HARDBACK BOUND IN THE ORIGINAL GILT DECORATED CLOTH BINDING, COMPLETE COPY WITH 12 FULL PAGE COLOUR PLATES BY RACKHAM WITH TISSUE GUARDS + NUMEROUS BLACK & WHITE ILLUSTRATIONS AMONG TEXT, ILLUSTRATED ENDPAPERS. BOOK MEASURES APPROX 10 X 8 INCHES. CLOTH IS DISCOLOURED TO EDGES OF FRONT & REAR BOARDS, CLOTH SPINE IS FADED WITH TEXT TO SPINE DULLED, MODERATE BROWNING & FOXING TO ENDPAPERS & HALF TITLE, OCCASIONAL LIGHT FOXING OR MINOR MARKS TO PAGES. OVERALL A FEW FAULTS BUT STILL A GOOD- VERY GOOD COPY WITH BOARDS FIRM & MAJORITY OF PAGES CLEAN. EXTRA POSTAGE COSTS MAY APPLY TO OVERSEAS ORDERS. ALL BOOKS POSTED IN STURDY BOOK BOX.

Seller: Elder Books, Ross on Wye, Herefordshire, United Kingdom

WALTON, Izaak (text); RACKHAM, Arthur (illustrations). The Compleat Angler, or The Contemplative Man's Recreation. Being a Discourse of Rivers, Fishponds, Fish, and Fishing not Unworthy the Perusal of Most Anglers. George C. Harrap & Co., Ltd, London, 1931.

Price: US$165.00 + shipping

Description: Trade Issue. Quarto (25.5cm); blue-green cloth, with titling and pictorial elements stamped in gilt on spine and front cover; top edge gilt; pictorial endpapers; [4],5-224pp, with tissue-guarded frontispiece and 11 plates of illustrations by Arthur Rackham. Light wear to spine ends and joints, gentle sunning to spine, with mild tanning to endpapers; Very Good+, lacking the dustjacket. LATIMORE & HASKELL, p.66-67.

Seller: Lorne Bair Rare Books, ABAA, Winchester, VA, U.S.A.

WALTON, IZAAK; RACKHAM, ARTHUR (ILLUSTRATIONS). The Compleat Angler. London: George C. Harrap, 1931.

Price: US$194.93 + shipping

Condition: Very Good

Description: - First Rackham Trade Edition - Gilt decorated board covers lightly faded, tanned and marked - Spine tanned and faded w/ ends crushed - Corners bumped and crushed - Gilt top edged text block faded w/ fore-edge and bottom edge toned and foxed - Endpapers unevenly toned w/ previous owner's name in pen to top corner front free endpaper - Margins lightly toned - Dustwrapper worn and tanned w/ edges rubbed and creased - Numerous tears and small sections missing to edges, corners and spine ends - Spine chipped and tanned - Book ow/ solid, clean and tight - 224 pages

Seller: Green Ink Booksellers, Hay-on-Wye, United Kingdom

Walton, Izaak.. The Compleat Angler or The Contemplative Man's Recreation. Being a Discourse of Rivers Fishponds Fish and Fishing not Unworthy the Perusal of Most Anglers.. George C. Harrap & Co. Ltd, London, 1931.

Price: US$225.00 + shipping

Condition: Fine

Description: Regular Trade Edition, First Impression. Illustrated by Arthur Rackham. Just About Fine in dark greyish-green cloth stamped in gilt at spine and on front cover, lacking the dustwrapper. Spine ends slightly pinched. Top edge gilt. Illustrated endpapers. Unmarked, clean, no writing, no foxing. 224pp. All illustrations present including frontispiece, glassine guards. Superior copy. Q19651

Seller: Compass Rose Books, ABAA-ILAB, Kensington, CA, U.S.A.

RACKHAM, Arthur (illustrates). WALTON, Izaak.. The Compleat Angler.. George C. Harrap, London., 1931.

Price: US$240.42 + shipping

Description: First edition with these illustrations. Quarto. 224 pages. Twelve colour plates, including frontispiece, with printed tissue guards, by Arthur Rackham. Original blue-green cloth with gilt design and lettering. Pictorial endpapers. Top edge gilt.Small ownership signature on half-title page. Spine a bit faded. Very good. No dustwrapper.

Seller: Peter Ellis, Bookseller, ABA, ILAB, London, United Kingdom

RACKHAM, Arthur (illustrates). WALTON, Izaak.. The Compleat Angler.. George C. Harrap, London., 1931.

Price: US$292.40 + shipping

Description: First edition with these illustrations. Quarto. 224 pages. Twelve colour plates, including frontispiece, with printed tissue guards, by Arthur Rackham. Original blue-green cloth with gilt design and lettering. Pictorial endpapers. Top edge gilt.Some fading to covers. Very good indeed in the uncommon dustwrapper which is good, torn with a few large chips and with the red lettering faded on the spine.

Seller: Peter Ellis, Bookseller, ABA, ILAB, London, United Kingdom

WALTON Izaak. The Compleat Angler. George C Harrap and Co Ltd, 1931.

Price: US$328.79 + shipping

Description: 223 pages, TEG, small 4to., 12 colour plates + drawings within the text, pictorial end papers by Arthur Rackham, grey cloth, gilt title and fish designs to upper cover, vg in dj. Press cutting pasted to verso of dj, not visble to front, 2 small chips to dj, head of spine and lower back edges a couple of small closed tears. The 1st Rackham edition was limited to 775 copies Coigney 313.

Seller: Hereward Books, Ely, CAMBR, United Kingdom

Walton. Izaak. The compleat Angler. The Contemplative Mans Recreation. Being a Discourse of Rivers, Fishponds, Fish and Fishing, Not Unworthy the Perusal of Most Anglers.. George C. Harrap & Co Ltd, London, 1931.

Price: US$597.98 + shipping

Condition: Very Good

Description: First Rackham Edition.Embossed leather.Gilt titled spine and front cover.Gilt decorated spine.Twelve colour illustrations .Illustrated endpapers.Very slight foxing to half title.

Seller: Banfield House Booksellers, Gympie, QLD, Australia

Walton, Izaak; [Arthur Rackham]. The Compleat Angler. George C. Harrap & Co., London, 1931.

Price: US$895.00 + shipping

Condition: Very Good

Description: Full Title: "Compleat Angler or The Contemplative Man's Recreation being a Discourse of Rivers, Fishponds, Fish and Fishing not unworthy the Perusal of most Anglers." Original publisher's full vellum, gilt stamped title and vignette, top edge gilt, others untrimmed with many pages being uncut, (10.5 x 8.25 inches). Deluxe Limited Edition, one of 775 copies, SIGNED by Arthur Rackham on limitation page. 223 pages; Illustrated title-page in green and black, 12 tissue-protected colored plates, many b&w in-text illustrations, pictorial endpapers all by Rackham. Showing only light wear and moderate spotting heaviest in upper corners, interior text and all plates are clean and bright, Armorial Bookplate of M. Warner Riddle on front free fly. Overall, a collectable, clean, tight copy unread copy of a desirable and sought-after title for the Walton or Rackham collector. Size: Quarto

Seller: Books & Bidders Antiquarian Booksellers, Cleveland, OH, U.S.A.

Walton, Izaak. The Compleat Angler. George C. Harrap and Co., London, 1931.

Price: US$1039.64 + shipping

Condition: Very Good

Description: Limited edition signed by Arthur Rackham. "Edition limited to Seven Hundred and Seventy-five copies, of which this is No. 711". Pages clean and bright, very light foxing on endpapers, some shelf wear to boards with some light spotting on rear cover and edges of boards, but overall very neat. Please inquire for photos of condition. Size: 4to

Seller: Bookcase, Carlisle, United Kingdom

WALTON, Izaak. RACKHAM, Arthur (illus.). The Compleat Angler or The Contemplative Man's Recreation. Being a Discourse of Rivers, Fishponds, Fish and Fishing not unworthy the Perusal of most Anglers.. George C. Harrap & Co. Ltd., London, 1931.

Price: US$1500.00 + shipping

Description: 224 pp. With twelve color plates by Arthur Rackham, each with captioned tissue overleaf. 4to, publisher's full gilt vellum, in publisher's slipcase. First edition; No. 198 of 775 copies, signed by Arthur Rackham. A beautiful, fine copy except for a significant bump that affects the top 1/2 inch of the spine and a corresponding (but larger) area at one corner of the slipcase. The numbered slipcase is lightly soiled, but sound at all joints.

Seller: Jeffrey H. Marks, Rare Books, ABAA, Rochester, NY, U.S.A.

RACKHAM, Arthur; WALTON, Izaak; BIRDSALL of Northampton. Compleat Angler or The Contemplative Man's Recreation, The. London: George G. Harrap & Co., 1931, 1931.

Price: US$1950.00 + shipping

Description: Bound By Birdsall "I Envy No Body But Him, and Him Only, That Catches More Fish Than I Do" [RACKHAM, Arthur, illustrator]. Walton, Izaak. [BIRDSALL of Northampton, Bindery]. The Compleat Angler or The Contemplative Man's Recreation. Being a Discourse of Rivers, Fishponds, Fish and Fishing not unworthy the Perusal of most Anglers. Illustrated by Arthur Rackham. London: George G. Harrap & Co., [1931]. First trade edition. Octavo (9 3/4 x 7 1/2 in; 247 x 190 mm). 223, (1) pp. Twelve color plates, and twenty-five black and white illustrations. Title printed in green and black. Bound c. 1931 by Birdsall of Northhampton for Charles Scribner's Sons in full forest green morocco with triples fillets border and central varicolored portrait onlay of Izaak Walton. Gilt framed and ornamented compartments. Top edge gilt, others untrimmed. Broad turn-ins with gilt rolls. Original endpapers preserved. A fine copy. In the binder's green cloth dust jacket, lettered in gilt on spine. The roots of Birdsall of Northampton "stretch back to the early eighteenth century but it was in 1792 that John Lacy's Northampton bindery was acquired by William Birdsall, continuing in his family until 1961.In Birdsall's heyday, Gerring (Notes on Bookbinding, 1899) reported a staff of 250 engaged in making ladies handbags, fancy boxes, and stationary; as well as all types of bookbinding. The firm seemed always ready to experiment and careful records and samples were kept by Richard Birdsall, great-great-nephew of the founder, until he died in 1909.The firm's collection of over 3,000 finishing tools passed to the University of Toronto" (Maggs, Bookbinding in the British Isles II, #262, and #321). Izaak Walton (1593-1683), "English biographer, who is best known for The Compleat Angler (1653), a classic guide to the joys of fishing with over 300 new printings. It combines practical information about angling with folklore. The story of three friends, traveling through the English countryside, is enlivened by occasional songs, ballads, quotations from several writers, and glimpses of an idyllic and now lost rural life.The Compleat Angler was a combination of manual and meditation. ‘Angling may be said to be so like the mathematics that it can never be fully learnt.' (The Compleat Angler) The work became one of the most reprinted books in the history of British letters. The story is of three sportsmen: a fisherman (Piscator, who is Walton himself), a huntsman (Venator), and a fowler (Auceps). They travel along the river Lea on the first day in May and discuss the relative merits of their favorite pastimes. Auceps tells how ‘the very birds of the air, those that be not Hawks, are both so many and so useful and pleasant to mankind, that I must not let them pass without some observations. They both feed and refresh him; feed him with their choice bodies, and refresh him with their heavenly voices.' In his own turn Venator defends hunting: ‘Hunting trains up the younger nobility to the use of manly exercises in their riper age. What more manly exercise than hunting the Wild Boar, the Stag, the Buck, the Fox, or the Hare? How doth it preserve health, and increase strength and activity!' And finally Piscator reminds his friends: ‘I might tell you that Almighty God is said to have spoken to a fish, but never to a beast; that he hath made a whale a ship, to carry and set his prophet, Jonah, safe on the appointed shore.' Walton drew his work on Nicholas Breton's (c. 1545-1626) fishing idyll Wits Trenchmour (1597). The second edition was largely rewritten and in the fifth edition Walton wrote about fly-fishing on the river Dove, a subject the author himself knew little about. The last [i.e., fifth] edition was published in 1676 and included additional material by Charles Cotton (Instructions how to Angle for a Trout or Grayling in a Clear Stream) and Colonel Robert Venables's The Experienced Angler, or Angling Improved. Walton called this work The Universal Angler. He had taught Cotton but never met Venables" ("Izaak Walton (1593-1683)" at Pegasosâ€"A Literature Related Resource Site). Latimore & Haskell, pp. 66-67. Riall, p. 175.

Seller: David Brass Rare Books, Inc., Calabasas, CA, U.S.A.

Walton, Izaak. Illustrated by Arthur Rackham. The Compleat Angler or The Contemplative Man's Recreation Being a Discourse of Rivers, Fishponds, Fish and Fishing no unworthy the Perusal of most Anglers.. George C. Harrap & Co Ltd, London, 1931.

Price: US$2000.00 + shipping

Description: Deluxe signed limited edition of Arthur Rackham's wonderfully illustrated rendition of The Compleat Angler. Quarto, original publisher's full vellum decorated in gilt, pictorial endpapers, illustrated by Arthur Rackham with 12 full-page color plates and 25 in-text line cuts. One of seven hundred and seventy-five numbered copies signed by Arthur Rackham, this is number 143. In fine condition. An exceptional example. Though intended in part as a practical guide for fishermen, the lasting influence of The Compleat Angler stems from its qualities as a work of literature: it is arguably the best long prose-pastoral in English. This edition is based on the Richard La Gallienne edition of 1897, which, in turn, relies on the text of the fifth edition of 1676, the last to be revised by Walton himself. It is the first to be illustrated by Arthur Rackham, whose “fanciful imagination gave his illustrations instant recognition, and his dedication to illustration kept him in the public eye for 30 years” (Hodnett, 233).

Seller: Raptis Rare Books, Palm Beach, FL, U.S.A.

Rackham illus. Izaak Walton. The Compleat Angler.. George C. Harrap & Co Ltd.,, 1931.

Price: US$2096.95 + shipping

Condition: Good

Description: Or the Contemplative Man's Recreation. Being a Discourse of Rivers Fishponds Fish and Fishing not Unworthy the Perusal of Most Anglers. Illus. by A. Rackham. Deluxe ed. 8vo. 224pp. Color frontispiece. 11 color plates. Some text-illus. Full publisher's vellum, stained and rubbed, gilt top, edges uncut, internally slightly spotted. Limited to 775 copies, this is no. 135, Rackham signed. With slipcase.

Seller: The Isseido Booksellers, ABAJ, ILAB, Tokyo, Japan