Several posts back, we examined a small number of collecting specialties (romance fiction, numismatic literature & fine press books) in order to suggest some "contrarian" ways you might build a private library. We suggested that you need a pretty broad exposure to the specialty in which you wish to collect in order to get a feel for what's available at what price. And we suggested several ways to obtain a broad overview of various book collecting specialties (e.g., bibliographies, periodicals, book fairs and book towns). Over the next several posts, we are going to take this information and apply it to building author-specific private libraries.
The first challenge that most folks encounter when building an author-specific library is focus. This is so because many authors represent more than one focus--Richard Nixon, for example, can be collected as either (or both) part of a a subject specialty (President of the United States) and as a prolific author (In the Arena). Arthur Conan Doyle can be collected either (or both) as part of a subject specialty (spiritualism) and as a prolific author (The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes). T.S. Eliot can be collected as either (or both) part of a subject specialty (literary criticism) and as a prolific poet (The Waste Land);
Additionally, some authors are so prolific or so highly esteemed that they are virtually a publishing industry unto themselves. Trying to figure out how to collect such authors can quickly become very expensive and potentially counter- productive unless you think through very carefully the various avenues that are available to collecting such authors.
Our next few posts will try to tackle some of these issues by focusing on ways that one might go about collecting the works of three very different authors: one is the most esteemed author in the English language; one served as Librarian of Congress while writing Pulitzer Prize-winning poetry and drama; the third married an archaeologist, wrote the longest-running play in theater history and remains the best selling mystery writer of all time....
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