RARE BOOK & COLLECTORS’ SALE 12th -13th December 2023

92 IMPERFECTIONS NOT STATED Fonsie Mealy’s Est. 1934 690 – See page 93 691. Photograph: Actor, Jimmy O’Dea, an original photograph, approx. 26cms x 20cms (10¼” x 8”), with bold signature, ‘Best Wishes - Jimmy O’Dea, Up Clonmel,’ unframed. As a photo, w.a.f. (1) €150 - €220 692. Autographs: A collection of black and white Photographs of Actors etc., including Richard Burton, Alec Guinness, Laurence Olivier, Vivien Leigh, Peter Usinov, together with a typed Autograph Letter Signed with autograph Photo from Rock Hudson, as a collection, as autographs, w.a.f. (1) €150 - €200 693. [Literary Interest] An early 20th Century “Underwood”Model No. 5 Typewriter, as is, w.a.f. (1) €120 - €180 688. Privately Printed - Limited to 200 Copies Only Wilde (Oscar) The Portrait of Mr. W.H., 4to Privately Printed No. 189 of Limited Edition of 200 Copies. c. 1904. Hf. title, 48pp. large margins, uncut, orig. ptd. blue wrappers, a few nicks to fore-edge, title printed within floral decorated border. V. good copy. Very Scarce. (1) €300 - €400 691 689. James Edward Kelly (1855-1933) “Oscar Wile,” lithograph on Japanese paper, dated 1882 (Jan.) approx. 23cms x 19cms, mounted and framed. (1) Note: The artist chosen was James Edward Kelly (1855 – 1933), a New Yorker of Irish descent, who grew up during the Civil War. It was this upbringing, perhaps, that caused Kelly to develop a lifelong interest in American history—indeed the subjects of his sculpture and illustrations are often people and events of American military history. The connection with Wilde continued when, as the Complete Works [1] reminds us, “Kelly was commissioned to provide five full-page designs and nine tailpieces for Rennel Rodd’s Rose Leaf and Apple Leaf (1882), to which Wilde contributed an introduction”. The drawing depicts Wilde, later famous for his children’s stories, seated in profile perhaps as storyteller, alongside an unidentified child. It is often speculated that the boy was Kelly’s son, but Matthew Sturgis in his biography Oscar Wilde (UK Edition: p. 778, n. 44) points out that Kelly had no son. Kelly used the head of Wilde from this image as the basis for an etching made to reproduce advertising media during 1882; and he also sculpted a similar clay bas-relief from which a bronze plaque was made. The image has since appeared in various guises, including in Wilde biographies €1500 - €2000 693