Victor Hugo Drawings, Barry Humphries's Wilde Collection, Presidential Letters: Auction Preview

Here's what I'll be watching this week:

At New England Book Auctions on Tuesday, February 11, 200 lots of Fine Books & Ephemera.

ALDE sells 251 lots from Une anthologie de la poésie française - Éditions originales du XIXe siècle II on Wednesday, February 12, including a copy of Charles Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du mal (1857), expected to reach €12,000–15,000. Arthur Rimbaud's Les Illuminations (1886) is estimated at €10,000–15,000.

At Dominic Winter Auctioneers on Wednesday, Printed Books, Maps & Decorative Prints, Autographs, Documents & Ephemera, Air Mail Covers, in 363 lots. A suite of 32 Sino-Japanese War battle scene triptychs (about 1895) are expected to sell for £700–1,000, while a collection of some 48,000 railway photographs is estimated at £500–800.

RR Auction sell 837 lots of Fine Autographs and Artifacts Featuring Presidents on Wednesday, with a 1792 letter signed by Thomas Jefferson as Secretary of State to Josiah Bartlett as Governor of New Hampshire announcing the ratification of the Bill of Rights expected to sell for more than $40,000. An 1816 Thomas Jefferson letter to merchant William Lee is estimated to exceed $20,000, as is a delightful 1810 letter from John Adams on which one of his granddaughters has scribbled across the top.

At Ader on Thursday, February 13, Lettres et Manuscrits Autographes, in 387 lots. Several original Victor Hugo drawings are expected to sell well, including an 1868 drawing of the Puente de los contrebandistas in the Pyrenees, given by Hugo to Jules Claretie (€50,000–60,000). A Richard Wagner manuscript of the vocal score for the role of Tannhäuser could fetch €20,000–30,000.

Swann Galleries sell 236 lots of Fine Photographs on Thursday, with Robert Mapplethorpe's "Double Jack in the Pulpit" (1988) and Roy DeCarava's "Hallway, New York" (1953) sharing the top estimate of $40,000–60,000.

Some books are included in the Christie's London sale on Thursday of Barry Humphries: The Personal Collection, among them #1 of 12 large paper copies on Japanese vellum of Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest, inscribed by Wilde to the book's publisher, Leonard Smithers (£100,000–150,000). A similar presentation copy of Wilde's Salomé (1893), inscribed to Viscount Encombe and later owned by Wilde's lover Lord Alfred Douglas is estimated at £40,000–60,000. There will be much more here of interest to the Wilde collector.

At PBA Galleries on Thursday, 63 lots of Steinbeck, Ricketts & the Western Flyer: The Ed Ricketts Jr. & Dennis Fry Collections (with additions). Expected to lead the way among the books is a first issue copy of Steinbeck's first book, Cup of Gold (1929), signed by Steinbeck and from the collection of his sister Esther Steinbeck Rodgers.

On Saturday, February 15, Potter & Potter Auctions will sell The Collection of Edwin A. Dawes, Part III, in 438 lots. A large advertising poster for Adelaide Herrmann dated to about 1905 is expected to sell for $5,000–10,000; many other posters and magic-related material rounds out this sale.