Cinema
It is unlikely that too many movie stars actually collect
film-related books; it is much more probable that this province belongs to
film-buffs. Chief of them all is Leonard Maltin, who devotes himself to classic
movie memorabilia, including film stills, posters and books. When he was
interviewing Ginger Rogers at her home he spotted a book of juvenile fiction on
one of her shelves, at which Ms Rogers exclaimed: ‘ My mother wrote that ‘. It
turned out that Lela Rogers had indeed published Ginger Rogers and the
Riddle of the Scarlet Cloak (1942 ). Later
on, he found a copy in a second hand bookstore and sent it to her to inscribe
for him. Today a poor copy of this book can be yours for around $1. One with a
jacket is currently online at $60.
Cookery
As well as the obvious celebrity chefs, such as Anton
Mossiman, Delia Smith and Jamie
Oliver, a less obvious collector is Jake Gyllenhaal, star of Brokeback Mountain. In an interview Gyllenhaal confessed
that as well as eating healthily and growing his own food, he loved collecting
old cookery books:
‘ I have a massive section in my library of beautiful old
cookery books. I really have a strange obsession with them…’
Diverse collectors
Madonna collects books, but perhaps only President Bill
Clinton knows exactly what she collects. Not too long ago, probably while he
was here for the Hay Festival, he took Madge for a tour of Charing Cross Road.
Did she visit Any Amount of Books ? Other celebs who described themselves as
collectors include Chelsea Clinton and Twilight star Robert Patinson, though doubtless security
considerations prevent many other celebs from revealing their collections to
the wider world.
Fine printing
Veteran lyricist and composer Leslie Bricusse (Goldfinger,
Scrooge, You Only Live Twice, Doctor Doolittle, Willy Wonka, Harry Potter etc
etc ) has amassed a superb collection of books on fine printing at his home in
California. Recently, a few books from his collection that were signed by the
Beatles have appeared on the market.
Graham Greene
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4q5Iu3h3_2zmiaaEiAjuv12xjkz_Y8To_Id31NTDsmuv1usE7XJ1QBNqKqIgylR3JVKMUz67BtxQsqy_3_PB270akyR9GdMEO-kh5i2XJnL1Z88yu2b9-knQkZlGn9APWkKcmt2H701Hi/s320/Rosenthal$$$$$.jpg)
History
The late multimillionaire Bee Gee, Robin Gibb, was extremely
keen on British history and had a sizeable library at the 12th
century Prebendal, his main home in Thame. In an interview he admitted that he
loved anything ‘old ‘ and certainly he belongs with Sting, Mick Jagger, Jimmy Page and Elton John as a rock star with
remarkable taste, at least in architecture. Such is the importance of The
Prebendal that Pevsner devotes two whole pages to it and contends that the 13th
century Chapel is 'one of the most
elegant EE buildings in the county’.
Jack Kerouac
Johnny Depp, star of the antiquarian book movie The Ninth
Gate, has confessed to being an avid collector of Jack Kerouac firsts, as well
as those by Edgar A. Poe, and
Dylan Thomas. Reportedly to have
‘weird‘ tastes, he is said to collect
dolls, insects and 'pig skeletons' too.
Wyndham Lewis
Vorticism is very cool at present (witness a simple Etchells
composition on paper that went for more than £100,000 recently ! ) and
arch-Vorticist Lewis has many admirers, particularly among the rock music
fraternity. These include the late Captain Beefheart, Brian Ferry, David Bowie,
and Holly Johnson, among many. Iain Sinclair is also a keen collector. The tale
of how he assembled an almost complete collection of Lewis on one visit to Farringdon
Road is fascinating:
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj91OSzvKWW-gchpK1Z6u-zZYOKxjC__QkvE3ZqPUu3VsoWn0zCFRXAfXIVvAJJ0DUKMnigRQdYbdzLBN8_Z_F15jHEYjW1NCGXn0egnWM0X0iFl3F2SkJyt933BGJ-KFoyLQqNu1N9CCiz/s320/lewis$$$$.jpg)
Veteran publisher Tom Rosenthal, the model for one half of Private
Eye’s Snipcock and Tweed, is a fanatical
Lewis man too. However, his superb library of major modernist literature, which
also includes wonderful firsts of Conrad, Joyce and D. H. Lawrence, is also
notable for the remarkable absence of books by a certain T. S. Eliot. ‘He’s an anti-Semite and I don’t want
his books in my library...' he once growled to an amazed Rick Gekoski. More
sensibly, Rosenthal also excludes anything by Mrs Virginia Woolf: ‘Boring
books, never admired her ‘.
Local history
In pursuit of books on his home county of Nottinghamshire the
late Alan Sillitoe was an inveterate browser among second hand bookshops
wherever he went. He found many treasures in or around Sussex and Kent. His theory
was that because people from the North and Midlands often retire to the
south-east coast their book collections end up there after their deaths.
Interestingly, Sillitoe only kept one copy of his debut novel Saturday Night
and Sunday Morning, which is the only
Sillitoe title to fetch much money
today.
Romantic novelist and professional Cumbrian Melvyn Bragg
also collects books on his native county: ‘ I’ve been told by my friends that I
have the best collection of books relating to Cumbria and my birthplace
Wigton.’, he claimed. [ R. M. Healey]
To be continued…
Many thanks Robin. It should be mentioned that Bragg is almost entirely uncollected and his books, even signed, can be bought for the price of a cup of tea. The Donn Byrne of our day. Who was he? Exactly. Enough Bragg bashing (I can do this because I am not seeking work in media.) Pig skeletons? Where does Depp get them? Are there dealers? Lastly I don't remember Clinton and Madonna coming in the shop but we get so many celebs (Boris, Hanif, Edwina) they may have gone unnoticed...
8 comments:
I totally disagree with your views on Melvyn Bragg, entitled as you are to them. He is the finest writer to have come out of the north since J B Priestley. The Maid of Buttermere is a masterpiece.
Not saying that Melvyn is a bad writer although I suspect he may be (and he has won a prize for bad sex writing) He may be better than Borges, Nabokov and Kafka. It is just that as a hardened trader, dealer, merchant, barrow boy or whatever I have noticed he is very, very hard to sell.
Pig skeletons? Certainly, Guv'nor:
http://www.animalskeletons.net/animal-skeletons-pig.html
I own the 1841 edition of Pugin's "Contrasts", bound in contemporary green morocco together with firsts of "True principles", "An apology for the revival of Christian architecture" and "A treatise on chancel screens and rood lofts", which was previously owned by Cher (Sonny &), who at one point owned a pretty extensive collection of Pugin-related books & furnishings.
I always though that Cher looked like a Pugin collector, but not Sonny...
'It is just that as a hardened trader, dealer, merchant, barrow boy or whatever I have noticed he is very, very hard to sell.'
Yes, the market doesn't lie when it comes to covetability. There's a Beerbohm story in Seven Men which is nice on this.
Happy Bloomsday everybody!
I have bought many, many Braggs over the years and I cannot remember selling a single one for more than 50p.
I agree with Bookride.
Free classifieds
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