Since 1996 Black Cat Books has been buying and selling fine used books in their book shop, now located in the heart of Shelter Island, N.Y.  Stop by and browse over 20,000 fine and used titles, in all subject areas. From it’s inception, Black Cat Books has offered a well-chosen selection of titles for the reader and collector, presented in a relaxed and inviting atmosphere. The Black Cat is the a place to discover something new to read, one from your favorite author, or an out of print title you haven’t seen for years. An ever changing stock of vintage collectibles & signed first editions are presented in a well maintained and orderly shop. The second floor is now open, so please feel free to stop in and check it out. Our hours are 10-5 every day, other times by chance or appointment. The owner and book buyer Dawn Hedberg is always looking to find new and collectible books in all subject areas.

If you have books to sell please feel free to contact us to make an appointment for a house call.

(631) 725-8654

blackcatbooks@yahoo.com

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· Category: About ·

So … This is love

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Ludwig Bemelmans is known best for his Madeline picture books. Bemelmans published six Madeline stories in his lifetime, five as picture books and one in a magazine. A seventh was discovered after his death and published posthumously

Description: SIGNED by LUDWIG BEMELMANS. Hardbound in 2nd Printing Dust Jacket. Published in a Limited First Edition of 985 unnumbered copies signed by Ludwig Bemelmans on the limitation page. Dust Jacket shows some wear including a large chip to the bottom outer corner of the front cover. Book shows light shelf wear and signs of use but is otherwise in good condition. Interior pages are clean with no writing or similar marks. Binding sound. RARE!

Bookseller Inventory # 73020

Madeline and the Bad Hat
Ludwig Bemelmans

$750

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Toni Morrison was an American novelist. Her first novel, The Bluest Eye, was published in 1970. The critically acclaimed Song of Solomon brought her national attention and won the National Book Critics Circle Award. In 1988, Morrison won the Pulitzer Prize for Beloved; she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1993.

Description: SIGNED and INSCRIBED by TONI MORRISON to the previous owner on the front free end page. First edition stated on the copyright page. Some minor shelf wear to corners and edges of black cloth boards. Dust jacket shows original $8.95 price. Minor foxing to outer page edges, otherwise very good.

Bookseller Inventory # 78094

Song Of Solomon
Toni Morrison

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

Anthony Bourdain was an American celebrity chef, author, and travel documentarian who starred in programs focusing on the exploration of international culture, cuisine, and the human condition. Although he is best known for his culinary writings, Bourdain also wrote crime fiction.

Description: SIGNED by ANTHONY BOURDAIN on the title page. Hardbound In Dust Jacket. First Edition. Two small private library stamps are present on the half title page. No other ex-library marks are present. Interior pages are otherwise clean with no writing, underlining, or similar marks. Book and dust jacket show light shelfwear and signs of use. Otherwise in very good condition. Binding sound. RARE!

Bookseller Inventory #77270

The Bobby Gold Stories
Anthony Bourdain

$300

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Truman Capote was a mainstay of the New York social scene. He traveled in an eclectic array of social circles, hobnobbing with authors, philanthropists, Hollywood and theatrical celebrities, royalty, and members of high society. He was well known for his distinctive, high-pitched voice and his offbeat manner of dress. To celebrate his rise to the top of high society in 1966 Capote hosted what would become known as the famous Black and White Ball, a virtual “who’s who” of the day. Truman Capote still remains among today’s most celebrated authors.

Description: SIGNED by TRUMAN CAPOTE on the front free end page. First printing stated on the copyright page. Hard bound in price clipped dust jacket that shows wear. Small ring stain to the front panel of jacket, and some soiling to rear. Jacket now protected in clear removable mylar cover. Boards show ear and staining. Some offsetting to front end pages, and dark staining to the rear end pages, otherwise good. No marks, underlining, or writing. A RARE signed copy!

Bookseller Inventory #77574

The Grass Harp
Truman Capote

$500

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Dame Hilary Mary Mantel was a British writer whose work includes historical fiction, personal memoirs and short stories. She will be best remembered for the Booker Prize winning best-selling novel Wolf Hall and its sequel, Bring Up the Bodies.

Description: Hard bound in original unclipped dust jacket that shows 18.99 UK price to lower edge. True first printing of the first UK Edition with “1” on the copyright page. Some minor edge wear to dust jacket that shows a few small creases to inside flaps. Interior clean, no marks or writing. Rare!

Bookseller Inventory # 77663

Wolf Hall
Hilary Mantel

$200

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James Salter Salter’s style is admired for its brevity and beauty. He has cemented a well-deserved reputation as one of the finest writers of tour time and has been compared to the American greats from Ernest Hemingway to Richard Yates.

Description: SIGNED & INSCRIBED by JAMES SALTER to the previous owners on the title page. Hardbound w/ Dust Jacket. Early Printing (No statement of edition). Price-clipped dust jacket shows wear including chipping along it edges and corners (see photos for details). Now protected in an archival Brodart cover. Hardcover boards and spine show some wear and minor fraying to their edges and corners. Spine has a slight slant. The bottom edge of the text block shows some light damp staining and waviness – otherwise good. Interior pages are clean with no writing or similar marks. Binding sound. RARE!

Bookseller Inventory # 74645

A Sport and a Passtime
James Salter

$650

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The New West is now regarded as a classic. Standing alongside Walker Evans’s American Photographs, and Robert Frank’s The Americans. The new West is a landmark volume of photography exploring American culture and society.

Description: Hardbound in dust jacket. 1st edition. Minor wear to edges of dust jacket that shows a small tear, otherwise very good. Interior clean and binding sound. Rare

Bookseller Inventory # 77426

The New West: Landscapes along the Colorado Front Range
Robert Hickman Adams

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

John Gardner was an American novelist, best known for his 1971 novel Grendel. Grendel is a retelling of part of the Old English poem Beowulf from the perspective of the antagonist, Grendel. In the novel, Grendel is portrayed as an antihero. The novel deals with finding meaning in the world, the power of literature and myth, and the nature of good and evil.

Description: SIGNED by JOHN GARDNER on the front free end page. Hardbound in unclipped Dust Jacket. First Edition. Dust Jacket shows fading to its orange spine, otherwise in very good condition. Purple cloth boards show light spotting and some minor wear to their edges. Interior pages are clean with no writing or similar marks. Binding sound. RARE!

Bookseller Inventory # 74642

Grendel
John Gardner

$950

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Description: True first edition (1st printing / 1st State). Hard bound in dust jacket. Meets all points of issue for first printing/1st state: Stated First Edition on the copyright page. Misspelled “MAUD’DIB” in the table of contents. Blue cloth boards with titles in white. Original first issued dust jacket with price of $5.95 on the dust jacket flap that shows four lines at bottom of rear DJ flap. This copy shows some minor edge wear to edges an corners. Interior clean and binding sound. The jacket shows some edge wear, with some minor chipping to spine edges and upper corners. Very minor sunning to spine edge of jacket and front panel, otherwise very good. Dune was awarded the first Nebula award for best science fiction novel and shared the Hugo award. The true first edition is increasingly rare and sought after.

Bookseller inventory # 73827

DUNE
Frank Herbert

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

Josef Koudelka, a nomad at heart has wandered around Europe with his 35mm Leica and little else. He was born in the Czech Republic, and made his first photographs there while a student in the 1950s. In the 196os he lived with and photographed the Gypsies of Slovakia, and later Romania, photographing them with an intimacy only gained through their total acceptance of him as one of their own. He returned to Czechoslovakia just two days before the Soviet invasion in August of 1968. He witnessed and recorded the military forces as they invaded Prague. Koudelka’s negatives were smuggled out of Prague into the hands of the Magnum agency, and were published anonymously under the initials P. P. (Prague Photographer) for fear of reprisal to him and his family. His pictures of the events became dramatic international symbols, and in 1969 the “anonymous Czech photographer” was awarded the Robert Capa Gold Medal for photographs requiring exceptional courage. Koudelka left Czechoslovakia for political asylum in 1970 and shortly thereafter joined The Magnum Agency. He remains an ever elusive figure who rarely attends events or signings, preferring to remain as he has always been… perpetually in motion.

Description: INSCRIBED & SIGNED BY JOSEF KOUDELKA on the title page ” to Jonas from Josef Koudelka”. Hard bound first printing with dust jacket. Koudelka’s first book, the work that sealed Koudelka’s reputation featuring 60 powerful black-and-white photogravure plates. This is the French edition of the book published simultaneously by Aperture under the title “Gypsies “. Foreword by Robert Delpire, and text by Willy Guy. Translated to French by Diane de Margerie. Some wear to corners and edges of dust jacket, and one small closed tear, otherwise very good. Interior clean and binding tight.

Bookseller Inventory # 25015

$1500

Gitans La Fin Du Voyage (Gypsies)
Koudelka, Josef

English Title: Gypsies; The Journey’s End
Publisher: Delpire Editeur
Publication Date: 1975
Edition: First French edition
Binding: Hardcover
Book Condition:   Very Good
Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good
Signed: Inscribed by Author(s)

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Umberto Eco is an Italian novelist, essayist, philosopher, literary critic. He is best known for his groundbreaking 1980 historical mystery novel Il nome della rosa (The Name of the Rose), an intellectual mystery combining semiotics in fiction, biblical analysis, medieval studies and literary theory.

Description: SIGNED by UMBERTO ECO on the title page. First printing of the firsy US edition. Price-clipped dust jacket shows light wear to its edges. Book shows minor foxing to the top edge of its text block, some light bumping to the corners of its boards, and other very minor shelfwear. Interior pages are clean with no writing or similar marks. Binding sound. RARE!”

Bookseller inventory # 72661

The Name of the Rose
Umberto Eco

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

Gertrude Stein was a central figure in the Parisian avant-garde of the early 20th century. She hosted the “New Moderns” which gathered in her Paris salon. She was an imposing figure, possessed of a remarkable self-confidence and a commanding manner.  With her partner Alice B. Toklas, she hosted such greats as Salvador Dali, Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, James Joyce and many others. Her writing which has come to be well respected, has been for the most part overshadowed by her more prolific contemporaries

Description: INSCRIBED AND SIGNED BY GERTRUDE STEIN on the front free end page. Hard bound in dust jacket. First edition, with first printing stated on the copyright page. Wear to jacket that shows chipping to edges. Interior clean and binding sound. RARE!

Bookseller Inventory # 46678

Four Saints in Three Acts: An Opera to be Sung
Gertrude Stein

$900

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Virginia Woolf was one the most innovative writers of the 20th century. She was a significant figure in London literary society, and probably the best known member of the Bloomsbury Group. In 1917 along with Leonard Woolf she founded the Hogarth Press, which subsequently published Virginia’s novels along with works by T.S. Eliot, Sigmund Freud, and others. Throughout her life, Woolf was plagued by periodic nervous breakdowns and associated illnesses. Though this instability often affected her social life, her literary productivity continued with few breaks until her suicide on 28 March 1941. After the final attack of mental illness Woolf put on her overcoat, filled its pockets with stones, and walked into the River Ouse near her home where she drowned. Woolf’s suicide, like Sylvia Plath’s, have much colored the interpretation of both her work and her life.

Description: First UK Edition. Published in an edition of 1000 copies. Hardbound with paper boards and a maroon cloth spine, no dust jacket as issued. The Hogarth Press, 1921. “Monday or Tueday” by Virginia Woolf, with woodcuts by Vanessa Bell. Light wear to boards and edges. Some offsetting to pages opposite the woodcuts – interior otherwise clean. Binding sound. Protected in mylar cover.

Bookseller Inventory # 65548

Monday or Tuesday
Virginia Woolf

$1650

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Peter Beard was an American artist who’s work documented the beauty and romance of Africa, and the tragedy of its endangered wildlife. He will be remembered for the artwork he created; a combination of newspaper clippings, old photos, fashion photography, found objects, all of which was combined with his own original drawings and collage.

Description: SIGNED & INSCRIBED by Peter beard with an ORIGINAL WATERCOLOR ILLUSTRATION . Hardbound in dust jacket. First Edition. Dust jacket shows some fading to its spine and light edgewear. Jacket now protected in a clear Brodart protective cover. Book shows light wear and signs of use to its boards and spine but is otherwise in good condition. Light foxing to page edges and end pages & small non-authorial gift inscription present on front free end page – interior pages are otherwise clean and free of any writing or similar marks. The binding is sound.

Bookseller Inventory #71554

Longing for Darkness: Kamante’s Tales from Out of Africa
Peter Beard

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

A Way of Seeing was Helen Levitt’s first published collection of photographs and features 50 incredible gravure plates of her pictures taken on the streets of Harlem and the Lower East Side. Levitt’s photographs are beautiful underrated works. Her pictures have sentiment without being sentimental, always maintaining an objective distance. The New York Times stated, “Helen Levitt was the first American photographer to fully comprehend the essence of Henri Cartier-Bresson’s photographic message and put it into practice.”

Description: Hardbound in dust jacket. First Edition. Photographs by Helen Levitt, with an essay by James Agee. Dust Jacket and book show light wear and some minor age toning, but otherwise in good condition. A bookplate is affixed to the front pastedown. Interior pages are otherwise clean with no writing, signs of ownership, or similar marks. Binding sound. One of the Seminal Photographic Books of the Twentieth Century. Rare and sought after!

Bookseller Inventory #71787

A Way Of Seeing
Levitt, Helen; Agee, James

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

Langston Hughes was an American poet, activist, novelist, and playwright. Hughes is best remembered as a seminal member of the 1920’s Harlem Renaissance, the African American artistic movement that celebrated black life and culture.

Description: SIGNED BY LANGSTON HUGHES on the front free end page. Hardbound w/ Dust Jacket. First Edition. Dust Jacket shows wear to its edges with some tears and chipping around the spine and corners. Light fading to the spine of the jacket. The book shows light wear to the edges of its boards – otherwise in very good condition. There are a few notes written in pencil in the margins of the book but the interior is otherwise clean. Binding sound. RARE!

Bookseller Inventory # 71350

The Big Sea
Langston Hughes

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

Paul Rand is acknowledged as one of the most important graphic designers of all time. He began his career in an era when working by hand was a given. He developed a fresh and individual design language drawn from European art movements including Russian constructivism, de Stijl, and the Bauhaus. He is probably best known for his corporate logo designs, including the logos for IBM, UPS, and  ABC. He taught design at Yale University, and was inducted into the New York Art Directors Club Hall of Fame in 1972.

Description: Signed and inscribed by Paul Rand on the front free end page. Dust Jacket shows light wear and light damp staining to its edges. Old price sticker affixed to the back cover. Board edges show light wear and signs of use but book is otherwise in very good condition. Interior clean and binding sound. RARE! 239 pages profusely illustrated with the work of Paul Rand, many in full color. A Rare copy, signed by the legendary graphic designer Paul Rand!

Bookseller Inventory# 69519

Paul Rand: A Designer’s Art
Rand, Paul

$250

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Growing up in Upper Manhattan, close to Harlem, Dennis Stock was exposed to jazz at an early age. As a child, Stock would accompany his father to the famous Apollo Theatre in Harlem, where prominent jazz musicians of the time such as Duke Ellington and Dizzy Gillespie would perform. These experiences would prove to be formative, sparking an interest that he would later return to as a photographer. In 1957, Stock embarked upon a journey inspired by those early memories that would culminate in one of his best-known bodies of work: ‘Jazz Street’.

Description: SIGNED AND INSCRIBED BY DENNIS STOCK. Stated 1st Edition. Hard bound in priced clipped dust jacket. Pages show minor toning, otherwise in very good condition. RARE!

Bookseller Inventory # 48363

Jazz Street:
A Photographic Exploration into the World of Jazz
Dennis Stock; Nat Hentoff

$450

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The Catcher in the Rye has been consistently listed as one of the best novels of the twentieth century. It was originally intended for adults but is often read by adolescents for its themes of angst and alienation, and as a critique on superficiality in society. Salinger managed to capture the exact moment between childhood and maturity, the unique moment between both worlds. Told in a realism and colloquial prose that has yet to be matched…. “If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap,” Holden Caulfield said. “But I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.”

Description: VERY RARE TRUE FIRST EDITION! Hardcover w/ First State Dust Jacket, First Edition / First Printing. Little, Brown and Co. 1951.  Meets Points of Issue: 1st Edition Stated on copyright page. Dust Jacket has Lotte Jacobi photography credit on back panel, and $3.00 price on Dust Jacket flap. Not a Book-of-the-Month Book Club edition! Loss to head and tail of Dust Jacket spine, and sun-fading to what remains of it. The front panel of the dust jacket has a closed tear to its upper left corner, but is very bright! There is wear to the edges and corners of the jacket, but it is overall in good condition. This is a first state jacket with slight cropping of Salinger’s head on its back panel! The gilt on the book’s spine has worn away, but besides that it has only minor shelf wear – slight bumping to the head and tail of the spine and very minor wear to the edges of the boards. There is foxing to the edge of the text block and slight offsetting from publisher’s glue darkening the interior front and back hinge – common to titles from this period. Besides these flaws, the interior of the book is clean and free of any writing or similar markings! Overall, the book is in very good condition! Binding sound!

Bookseller Inventory # 61631

The Catcher In The Rye
J. D. Salinger

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

Andy Warhol was a painter, printmaker, filmmaker and the leading figure in the POP Art movement. Appropriating images from popular culture, Warhol created many paintings that remain icons of 20th-century art, such as the Campbell’s Soup Cans, Disasters and Marilyns. He was known in the late sixties and early seventies as resident host at his studio, The Factory. Warhol also made several 16mm films which have now become underground classics. The core of his autobiography reads like a collection of sound-bites, moving amongst the anecdotes and aphorisms. His descriptions of inner thoughts and perceptions are candid and unblinking, ranging from moments of elucidation to mildly eccentric digressions on the seemingly trivial and banal. Warhol talks about love, sex, beauty, fame, work, money, success, New York, Americana; and mostly about himself.

Description: SIGNED BY ANDY WARHOL in black marker with his initials on the front free end page. Hard bound with dust jacket. Quarter orange cloth over yellow paper covered boards. Some minor edge wear, otherwise very good.

Bookseller Inventory # 19310

The Philosophy of Andy Warhol: From a to B and Back Again
by Andy Warhol

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

Man Ray was a significant contributor to the Dada and Surrealist movements. He was best known for his photography, and he was a renowned fashion and portrait photographer. Ray is also noted for his work with photograms, which he called “rayographs” in reference to himself. Significant members of the art world, such as James Joyce, Gertrude Stein, Jean Cocteau,  Antonin Artaud, & Dali all posed for his camera.

Description: Original spiral bound color photographically illustrated stiff wrappers. Wear to wrappers, with original spiral binding damaged. Some minor foxing, otherwise very good. This important work is Man Ray’s first monograph. It begins with a portrait drawing of Man Ray by Pablo Picasso and consists of 104 photographs divided into five sections. The Man Ray photographs contained in this edition are regarded by some as the greatest of the twentieth century. As this was Man Ray’s first monograph, his friends pulled out all the stops to herald it. It contains poetry and essays by the leading figures of the Dada and Surrealist movements: André Breton, Paul Éluard, Marcel Duchamp (written under his famous pseudonym “Rrose Selavy”) and Tristan Tzara. Containing 84 stunning full page black and white monochromes (photographs) and 19 rayographs. Very rare and sought after!

Bookseller Inventory #49095

Man Ray Photographs 1920-1934
Man Ray

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

James Baldwin broke new literary ground with his exploration of racial issues. Baldwin was profoundly marked by three distinctive identities in his life…  being black… being poor, and being homosexual. Social discrimination would be a recurring theme throughout  his work, especially his writing on the black experience in America. Baldwin became one of the most prominent figures of the Civil Rights Movement, and along with Richard Wright and Ralph Ellison, became spokesman for the entire generation of black writers. Blues For Mr. Charlie is James Baldwin’s best known play. Baldwin said it is based distantly on the true story of the Mississippii youth Emmett Till, who in 1955 was murdered for whistling at a white woman.

Description: SIGNED BY JAMES BALDWIN on the front free end page. Hard bound with original Bernard Brussel-Smith designed dust jacket. First edition, with $3.95 on inner front flap of dust jacket.  Some shelf wear to dust jacket, otherwise very good. Interior clean and binding sound.

Bookseller Inventory # 33906

Blues For Mister Charlie
Baldwin, James

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

The Sheltering Sky is a 1949 novel of post-colonial alienation and existential despair by American writer and composer Paul Bowles. The story centers around Port Moresby and his wife Kit, a married couple originally from New York who travel to the North African desert accompanied by their friend Tunner. The journey, initially an attempt by Port and Kit to resolve their marital difficulties, is quickly fraught by the travelers’ ignorance of the dangers that surround them.  In his 1949 review for The New York Times, Tennessee Williams remarked, “With the hesitant exception of one or two war books by returned soldiers, The Sheltering Sky alone of the books that I have recently read by American authors appears to bear the spiritual imprint of recent history in the western world.”.

Description: TRUE FIRST EDITION. First printing of the first edition. Hard bound in dust jacket. Meets all points of issue including $2.75 price on dust jacket.  Some minor wear to page edges and boards, otherwise with interior clean and binding sound. The original Lustig designed dust jacket shows several tears, with spine edges and corners chipped. Now protected in clear removable mylar cover. The Sheltering Sky tells the story of an American couple who travel from New York to Northern Africa during the waning years of the colonial era. An instant critical and popular success, The Sheltering Sky established Bowles as an important American author. Rare and sought after!

Bookseller Inventory # 41673

The Sheltering Sky
Bowles, Paul

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·

Massimo Vignelli was an acclaimed graphic designer who probably more than anyone else, is credited for introducing a European Modernist point of view to American graphic design. Vignelli’s work has been exhibited in North America and Europe. It is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York, as well as museums in Philadelphia, Montreal, Jerusalem, Munich and Hamburg, Germany. He will be best remembered for his focus on simplicity, and his use of basic geometric forms, a theme throughout all of his work.

Description: INSCRIBED BY MASSIMO VIGNELLI in silver on the front free end page “To Natasha Hopkinson with congratulations –  Massimo Vignelli”. Hard bound with dust jacket. First printing of the first edition.  Original black cloth, title blind-stamped on upper cover, spine lettered in white. Writing in pen on page 262, otherwise with interior clean. Vignelli Associates work in the modernist tradition, focusing on simplicity through the use of basic geometric forms. Their designs range from package design to furniture design and from public signage to showroom design.

Bookseller Inventory # 31096

Design: Vignelli
Celant, Germano

SOLD

· Category: Sold ·