Attempted Bloggery: The King's Stilts

Showing posts with label The King's Stilts. Show all posts

Sunday, June 22, 2014

An Extra Nizzard from Dr. Seuss

Earlier this month, Bonhams sold this copy of The King's Stilts (1939) with an original drawing by Dr. Seuss. The Nizzard in question is a troublesome bird which appears in the story. Flocks of Nizzards threaten to peck away at the Dike Trees that protect the island kingdom of Binn from inundation by the surrounding waters. This extra Nizzard, on the other hand, should be no trouble.

Dr. Seuss, Drawing of a Nizzard inscibed "EXTRA NIZZARD FOR WOODY [Woodward Dike] from Dr. Seuss" in The King's Stilts (New York: Random House, 1939).

http://www.bonhams.com/auctions/21652/lot/71/

July 29, 2013 Update: The drawing has been purchased by a Connecticut bookseller who duly removed it from the book and had it framed. It is offered for sale once again, this time on eBay. Whatever the cost of framing, the markup is likely still above 100%. A cursory examination of the Meier and Sons Rare Books website reveals it is their common practice to dismantle books in order to frame original drawings within them. I suspect this is not all that unusual in the industry.

EBay Listing

http://www.ebay.com/itm/AN-ORIGINAL-SIGNED-AND-INSCRIBED-ASSOCIATION-DRAWING-BY-DR-SEUSS-OF-A-NIZZARD-/251598104127?pt=Antiquarian_Collectible&hash=item3a946a663f

Note: Don't miss my other posts on the good Dr. Seuss. Don't forget that he also furnished that quotation up on the header.

Other signed books with original drawings are featured on this blog as well. Got any to share?

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Tuesday, September 27, 2011

The King's Stilts

From Illustration House comes this listing for a rare children's book illustration by Dr. Seuss from The King's Stilts. Few original book illustrations by this favorite artist come to the market for reasons explained in the listing, but it nevertheless may be a stretch to ask $130,000 for this one. Still, there's simply not much out there for avid collectors, and some enterprising individual just may be willing to pay the steep price.

This piece is part of an exhibition that opened on February 27, 2010. I do not know whether any of the illustrations are still available.

Dr. Seuss, Original Illustration from The King's Stilts, 1939

Theodore "Dr. Seuss" Geisel

1904-1991

Boy tries to warn the King, but is intercepted by Lord Droon.

Book illustration: The King's Stilts, by Dr. Seuss; Publisher: (Random House), 1939;
Ink and gouache en grisaille, 13 x 9", signed ll

$130,000

Published children's book drawings by Dr. Seuss are extremely scarce on the market, as the artist made a bequest of virtually his entire such output to the Geisel Library at UCSD.
Provenance - Los Angeles literary agent Frances Pindyke.

Condition - Good overall: slightly trimmed at top; matted and framed.

This illustrates the passage where the page boy Eric tries to warn the King of Lord Droon’s nefarious attempt to usurp the King’s power, but is intercepted by Droon himself, who locks Eric up in quarantine, pretending that he sees symptoms of measles. It’s a full page illustration, a fine one, from a memorably dramatic moment in the story. This drawing sold at an Illustration House auction in December 2007 for $80,500.