What Actually is a "Rare" Book?
Rebecca Romney, rare book dealer and collector at Type Punch Matrix, has shared her thoughts on Twitter about what she describes as "one of the most important skills a rare book dealer can possess: knowing the difference between what’s new/unusual to them and what’s legitimately rare."
Although it's had lots of views on Twitter, we felt that those of you not on the social media site would be interested in her thoughts and so here, with her permission, is Rebecca's thread on the subject:
Today I’m thinking about one of the most important skills a rare book dealer can possess: knowing the difference between what’s new/unusual to them and what’s legitimately rare.
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
When you’re new to rare books, there is so much to discover. Fore-edge paintings! Recycled papers used in bindings! Miniature books! Gauffered edges! Foolscap watermarks that depict that endlessly cool jester!
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
These things are awesome! And also common.
If you don’t have a lot of experience, and you don’t see a lot of comps immediately on the current marketplace, you may catalogue and price a thing way outside of its actual record of prices realized and known copies.
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
But maybe you can get that price. Ok: more power to you (as long as there are no factual misstatements in your description). The marketplace of second sale, of collectibles, is very weird. A book sells at the price at which someone is willing to pay for it. And yet.
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
This is one of the reasons why I respect expertise in fellow dealers.
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
When an inexperienced dealer finds an inscribed Hemingway, that’s big! They haven’t seen one before! It must be $$$$!
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
But at the big company where I was trained, inscribed Hemingways were a regular thing.
They are very cool! But they did not impress because of their rarity.
So perhaps surprisingly, the big company may have more reasonable prices on inscribed Hemingways than a random seller who never handled one before. Enthusiasm affects pricing here, & an inexperienced seller may be more enthusiastic than is merited by a book’s actual rarity.
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
A well known example: Rare book people constantly rolling their eyes at the Shakespeare First Folio being called “rare” by journalists when there are hundreds of surviving copies.
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
Another practical example: If Ken Lopez, a specialist in postwar fiction, tells me that he’s only seen 2 copies of a novel from 1972, I take that a lot more seriously than a random dealer’s claims to rarity about a novel I’ve seen Lopez handle a dozen times.
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
To be clear: “common” does not mean “bad” — I hope my earlier adjective “awesome” makes that obvious. But it does mean a dealer should not be increasing their price due to scarcity. A Shakespeare Folio or inscribed Hemingway get pricey because of demand more than scarcity.
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
AND any dealer can make a real impact where more established dealers may have gotten blasé: If you bring a new perspective to something about why it’s interesting/important, then yes, you may be able to legitimately charge more than a more established dealer.
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
But in these cases, you’re fiddling with the demand side of the equation, not the supply/scarcity side. You’re making a pitch about why demand should be higher.
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
These are my random Friday thoughts on valuing expertise in this profession after staying up far too late on eBay last night. Feeling appreciative of the specialists among my colleagues today.
— Rebecca Romney (@rebeccaromney) March 3, 2023
