Book collecting

yeah ok so i've kinda gotten into book collecting. i've only paid over a thousand for three books: ~$5,000 for a signed first edition (Fair) of Finnegan's Wake, ~$3,000 for a signed ARC (Mint) of Infinite Jest (later sold for $5,000), and $3,000 for an unsigned first edition (Very Fine) of Gravity's Rainbow (later sold for $4,500). I have no intentions of selling the Wake.

(Probably) not happening

These don't generally sell for less than $25,000, if they exist. I cannot at this time justify spending $25K on a book. Well, maybe a signed first Ulysses.

• Signed first Ulysses
• Signed Feynman Lectures on Physics
• Signed Discipline of Programming (Dijkstra) (do any exist?)

Dream acquisitions

These run $5K--$25K if you want them in any decent shape.

• Signed first Blood Meridian
• Signed first Dubliners
• Signed first Gravity's Rainbow
• First Moby-Dick
• Signed Gone with the Wind
• Signed first Waiting for Godot
• Signed T. S. Eliot (ideally some printing of The Waste Land)
• Signed first Ariel (Plath)
• Signed first Rushdie (The Satanic Verses)

Doable

• Signed first Infinite Jest
• Signed Schrodinger's Cat trilogy
• Signed first The Power of One
• Signed first American Prometheus
• Signed first A Clockwork Orange
• Signed first The Making of the Atomic Bomb
• Signed first The Soul of a New Machine
• Signed first The Emperor of All Maladies
• Signed first Watership Down

Got 'em

All are hardback unless otherwise indicated. "First" indicates either the first American edition, or the country in which the book originally appeared.

Unsigned rarities

• First McCarthy (Blood Meridian)
• First Wilson (Schrödinger's Cat trilogy, three paperbacks, no hardback first exists)

Signed

Everything but the Penrose and Aaronson were acquired signed. I got Sir Roger to sign my Road to Reality when he gave a talk at Georgia Tech. My ex-wife Emily got Scott to sign my Quantum Computing Since Democritus when she was at UT Austin.

• Signed first Burroughs (Naked Lunch)
• Signed first Burroughs (The Last Words of Dutch Schultz)
• Signed first Ginsberg (Collected Poems)
• Signed first Flynn (Gone Girl)
• Signed first Coupland (Microserfs)
• Signed first Leyner (My Cousin, My Gastroenterologist, paperback)
• Signed first Gibson (Burning Chrome)
• Signed first Joyce (Finnegan's Wake)
• Signed first Penrose (The Road to Reality)
• Signed first Ginsberg (Howl and Other Poems, City Lights paperback, no hardback first exists)
• Signed first Ferlinghetti (Coney Island of the Mind and Other Poems, City Lights paperback, no hardback first exists)
• Signed Wilson (Illuminatus! trilogy, omnibus paperback edition, no hardback exists)
• Signed Aaronson (Quantum Computing Since Democritus, paperback, no hardback exists)
• Signed Schrödinger (lecture notes, not a book)

Signed at publisher

These are special editions, signed en bloc at the publisher, usually in elaborate hardcover presentation and including a statement of authenticity. Suntup, Easton Press, and Franklin Press are major purveyors. The Folio Society prints similar editions, but does not generally have them signed.

• Signed Rovelli (Helgoland) (Easton Press)
• Signed Wilzcek (Ten Keys to Reality) (Easton Press)
• Signed Dyson (Disturbing the Universe) (Easton Press)
• Signed Gibson (Neuromancer) (Easton Press)
• Signed Ellison (Invisible Man) (Franklin Press)
• Signed Styron (Sophie's Choice) (Franklin Press)
• Signed first McCarthy (The Passenger+Stella Maris, both signed in boxset)