Well, dear readers, it is Sunday, a day of rest, and I really do hope to get some, after addressing and stamping a lot of packages for tomorrow’s CD shipping day. But enough about me. I was just sitting here like so much fish perusing eBay as is sometimes my wont or even my want. Now, I have gotten many wonderful items on eBay, and I must say I’ve had some extraordinary luck getting some incredible bargains in the bargain. I’ve been on eBay since the first year of its existence after they stopped being a Pez-exclusive site. In fact, one of the first things I got were some rare Pez machines. It was wild and wooly in those early days – frustrating (no snipe programs back then), maddening, and a lot of fun. It is no longer a lot of fun, but it does continue to be frustrating and maddening, not necessarily in that order. Why? Because in certain categories you have complete idiot and/or scam artists selling things. These are not people who are there to just have fun selling stuff – they are serious idiots and serious scam artists, and you will find the majority of them in the first edition books category. eBay has single-handedly caused more confusion for more people in terms of first editions. In fact, I just read a “knowledgeable” dealers explanation which stated that the term first edition is meaningless and that first printing was what you wanted. I’ve been collecting first editions since around 1970 and up until eBay all you needed to know from a bookseller was if a book was a first edition. There was no palaver about printings. No, that happened on eBay because suddenly you had idiots and scam artists selling books as first editions that were not first editions – no, they were second printings or eighth printings. Note to idiots and scam artists: You cannot call a book a first edition if it’s a second printing (or higher). It’s not brain surgery, but now even dealers, seeing there’s money to be made on worthless subsequent printings, have embraced the confusion. In the old days when this hobby actually meant something and wasn’t a game for fools, subsequent printings were basically worthless. First editions without dust jackets were worthless. Book Club editions were beyond worthless. Now we have “dealers” selling Book Club Editions of To Kill A Mockingbird as First Edition, Book Club. Uh – no. And they’re selling them for hundreds of dollars and occasionally they get some poor sucker who doesn’t know better to actually buy the damn thing. Pity the poor sucker if they ever go to resell, when they’re told by a dealer that their hundreds of dollars book club edition is worth twenty-five cents. Happily, most of the outrageously priced books never sell – how these idiots and scam artists can afford to list these things over and over is anyone’s guess. If a book is worth, say $750 on a good day, you can be sure to find a copy in mediocre condition for five times that amount. I never think I’ll be shocked anymore, but there’s always something that’s totally shocking. There’s currently a copy of Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep for four thousand dollars. Now, a primo copy of that book would fetch upwards of ten grand (you know this if you’ve read my short story, The Book Scout). This, however, is an okay copy with – wait for it – a “facsimile (read Xerox) dust jacket. That is another in the latest series of dealer scams. Even fifteen years ago a copy of The Big Sleep first edition in like condition with no jacket could be had for thirty dollars, tops. A book in a “facsimile” dust jacket is worthless to a real collector. Heaven help idiot speculators in this climate – they’re overpaying and probably buying things that will have no value should they resell.
And that’s another trend that’s happening lately with art – people who have been frightened off the stock market have been swooping down on all sorts of auction houses selling illustration art and they’ve been bidding up the prices to all-time highs – well, illustration art, something I know a little about, having collected it since 1994, has peaks and also has a lot more valleys. A famous collector, Charles Martignette passed away a year or so ago – he had a huge illustration art collection and was one of the main reasons the hobby had gotten to be no fun – he simply had money and outbid everyone, sometimes severely overpaying, hoping that his doing so would drive the market up. It never quite worked out that way. Until now. Some of his pin-up art by Elvgren went for over one hundred thousand bucks – no one has EVER paid that much for a pin-up painting. The fact is, I had a prime Elvgren and I had a prime Earl Moran – when I had to sell stuff because of the lawsuit, both went to Martignette – and he paid perhaps ten percent of one hundred thousand bucks. And I made money when he did so, because I’d paid half of that. Which is what they were worth. Many years ago, I had the chance to purchase a Rockwell Saturday Evening Post cover original painting, one of his classics. It was one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars. If I’d had the money, I would have done it, but that was the same price I’d just paid for my HOUSE. Today, that painting would probably sell for a million dollars. But back to eBay – one can still find the occasional bargain, which is why I keep going back. In the past year I’ve found some really good first editions for really excellent prices because I saved certain sellers and began checking them regularly. They had great condition books at great prices and everything I got was worth quadruple the cost and in a couple of cases a good deal more than that.
When I was first on eBay, vintage radios were really fun to peruse. I got a classic Bakelite Fada radio for forty dollars – the same exact radio on eBay today would bring five hundred easily. It’s not worth five hundred, but I thought it was a great deal at forty, especially because it actually works. I got in a fight a few months ago with a “dealer” who was selling a first edition of Leon Uris’ Exodus. The little photo looked like it was in nice condition and the price was right at about eighty bucks. I went into the item description and looked at the other photos, including one of the front dust jacket flap. There was no price. No price, 99% of the time, means book club edition. He also had a photo of the copyright page. No mention of “first edition” which there should have been. I wrote him a nice e-mail saying he was selling a book club as a first edition and that if anyone bought it, he’d probably get it back. He wrote me back the most offensive, abusive e-mail, and apparently he hadn’t heard that you never EVER want to do that with me. So, I wrote him back a rather, shall we say, pointed e-mail – he wrote me back, and then reported me to eBay. I e-mailed them all the correspondence and then got someone on the phone and we went over it all. They then threw him off, which is what he deserved, since he was blatantly lying (that had become obvious) in his item description for that and other things he was listing. And that’s the problem – amateurs, scam artists, idiots. If you find a good dealer, save him/her to your favorites. If you have a bad experience, get eBay on the phone (they finally have a customer service number now). If you’re unsure of what you’re buying, do a Google search and see if you can find the information – or ask right here on haineshisway.com, since we have very knowledgeable people here.
My goodness, I just wrote three pages on eBay. Don’t I have relaxing notes to write? Well, let me just speed through them. Yesterday was a very nice day. I got up late, had no time to jog, and made the long drive to West Hills to get the Inspector Clouseau booklets signed by composer Ken Thorne. I hadn’t met Mr. Thorne before – he’s a real gent, and a wonderful man, and we had a really nice chat while he graciously signed the booklets. The whole thing took less than forty minutes. I drove back to the City of Studio, got some mail and one package, and then went and had an egg salad sandwich and a piece of chocolate mousse cake, which is what I had a craving for. After that, I came home, wrote a blurb for our new release, and then sat on my couch like so much fish.
Last night, I finished watching the region B Blu and Ray of The Red Shoes. The transfer was indeed derived from the new UCLA restoration by friend and neighbor Bob Gitt. Most of it is a thing of astonishing beauty and clarity, with vivid, wonderful color. Only a handful of shots lack extreme sharpness, and I suspect those are the A and B sides of opticals. Some of the shots actually take one’s breath away, so beautifully rendered are they. The film, for me, remains a mixed bag, with incredible visual flair, some terrific performances, the stunning ballet, but somehow it never quite reaches the heights of Black Narcissus. That’s not to say that The Red Shoes is not a stunning piece of work, because it is. The Blu-Ray is highly recommended by the likes of me. I then watched another region B Blu-Ray entitled Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, one of those realistic kitchen-sink Brit dramas. I’d never seen it, and I must say I really liked it quite a lot. It’s excellently directed by Karel Reisz, and the performances by Albert Finney, Rachel Roberts, and Shirley Anne Field are all great. Also great is the black-and-white photography of Freddie Francis, which is mostly shown to splendid advantage in this Blu-Ray, with only a handful of scenes exhibiting a little too much grain.
What am I, Ebert and Roeper all of a sudden? Why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because these notes are way too long for a restful Sunday.
Today, as noted, I’ll be addressing and stamping packages with the help of Mr. Cason Murphy. I’ll then do some liner notes writing, and then watch more motion pictures on Blu-Ray.
Tomorrow, of course, is a day of shipping, and I have the feeling it will take all the livelong day. The rest of the week will be filled with meetings, some meals, and a lot of work on the computer, plus we’ll be announcing the new Kritzerland release.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, do the long jog, I must package and stamp, and I must relax. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s free-for-all day, the day in which you dear readers get to make with the topics and we all get to post about them. So, let’s have loads of lovely topics and loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst we all also mention our favorite eBay moments.