Book collectors often confuse association copies with presentation copies. They are not the same thing. If you click on one of the glossaries in the left-hand column, you will discover that a presentation copy is merely a spontaneous gift of a title, the gift not necessarily from the author of the title. The recipient, in this definition, need have no known association with the author. The 19th century leather-bound volumes of the classics that often were presented as school prizes are a good example of this meaning of the term. There are, of course, various other gradations of meaning, to which you are referred to ABC for Book Collectors in the left column.
Only when an author makes a gift of a title to someone that has a known association with the author does the term association copy rightly apply (it also applies to titles owned by the author himself that bear evidence of such ownership). In yesterday's post, for example, the association between Nixon and Burger was very clear and very strong--Nixon appointed Burger Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, which did not prevent Burger from siding with a unanimous majority in ordering Nixon to turn over the White House tapes.
All other things being equal, association copies of a particular title command a substantial premium over all other copies of a particular title in the marketplace. This is especially true if both the author and the recipient are famous in their own right. Here are a couple of additional examples currently available in the marketplace:
The above title, Of Dramatic Poesie..., includes a Dialogue on Poetic Drama by one of the 20th century's greatest poets, Nobel laureate T. S. Eliot. Eliot has gifted the book to one of the 20th century's greatest novelists, Virginia Woolf. This is copy number #373 of 580 copies published of the 1928 First Edition, First Impression.
The above title, American Notes..., was given by famed Victorian novelist Charles Dickens to his friend, the eminent Victorian painter Daniel Maclise. Their friendship "was among the closest Dickens knew during his life." This copy was inscribed to Maclise the day before official publication (18 October 1842).
Just as association copies are evidence of provenance, so are bookplates, a subject to which we shall turn tomorrow....
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