Miniature books made by the Brontë sisters and their brother during their childhood in 19th century Englande century, have long been objects of fascination, coveted by collectors.
Charlotte Brontë (1816-1855), the third daughter of the family, is said to have made a good two dozen, all designed to look like printed books. And one of them, titled A Book of Rhymes (“A book of rhymes”), has just reappeared unexpectedly, reports The New York Times.
Disappeared since 1916
This is a “15-page book, no bigger than a playing card, says the American daily. He had been seen for the last time in 1916, in New York, during an auction, where he had been taken away for 520 dollars before disappearing, without anyone knowing what had become of him, nor even his ‘it had not been destroyed’.
A Book of Rhymes goes on sale on April 21, at the opening of the New York International Antiquarian Book Fair, an international antiquarian book fair. The very day of Charlotte Brontë’s birthday. The price tag? 1.25 million dollars, or approximately 920,000 euros.
The title of the ten poems that the mini-book contains was known. He appeared in the biography of the writer that Elizabeth Gaskell published in 1857 (translated into French by Éditions du Rocher under the title Charlotte Brontë). As specified by New York Times :
“But the poems in question had never been published, photographed, transcribed or even summarized.”
The little book was found in an envelope, itself slipped into a 19th century school book.e century owned by an American private collector, reports the American newspaper.