Book Binder - Collect Rare Books

Margaret Stead – Do you collect any rare books?

Paul Tronson – I have an antiquarian bookshop above my workshop full of wonderful rare books, the prize must be a first edition Don Quixote, another is a John Minshew variant copy of Annals of Princess Elizabeth I 1635 by William Camden who was given access to all the secret papers of her secretary Cecil Burghley, this is one of only two known existing copies. I also possess a 1614 first edition, first issue of Sir Walter Raleigh’s ‘History of the World’ that was written by him in prison. This edition was suppressed and seized by James I of England (James VI of Scotland) who wrote to all the Bishops in Europe and told them exactly what he would do to them if they did not burn every copy, only a handful are thought to exist.

There is a list of rare books for sale on my website at:

http://periodfinebindings.typepad.com/rare_books_for_sale_resto/