Conquest of Everest - First Edition - Signed - Edmund Hillary - Bauman Rare Books

Conquest of Everest

Edmund HILLARY | John HUNT

Item#: 84913 We're sorry, this item has been sold

Conquest of Everest

Conquest of Everest

SIGNED BY SIR EDMUND HILLARY

HUNT, John. The Conquest of Everest. With a Chapter on the Final Assault by Sir Edmund Hillary. New York: E.P. Dutton, 1954. Octavo, original tan and blue pictorial cloth, original dust jacket.

First American edition, signed by Sir Edmund Hillary on the title page, with eight color photographic plates, 48 half-tone plates and a number of in-text illustrations after pen-and-ink sketches.

“A definitive account worth reading” (Krawczyk 465). The 1953 British Expedition to Mount Everest was the eighth in 30 years to attempt Everest. On May 29th, 1953 Sir Edmund Hillary and Sherpa guide Tenzing Norgay at last stood at the summit; it was a culminating moment in mountaineering history, and one of the great achievements of human stamina and will. The Conquest of Everest was written by Sir John Hunt, the leader of the expedition. Chapter 16 is Sir Edmund Hillary’s stirring account of the final part of the climb, and the appendices are by members of the expedition. Illustrated with color and black-and-white photographic plates and numerous in-text illustrations. Preceded by the English edition of 1953, titled The Ascent of Everest. Neate 393. Contemporary gift inscription.

Interior fine; light wear to cloth extremities. Slightest wear to extremities of bright dust jacket. A near-fine signed copy.

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Aquatint Copperplate process by which the plate is “bitten” by exposure to acid. By changing the areas of the plate that are exposed and the length of time the plate is submerged in the acid bath, the engraver can obtain fine and varying shades of gray that closely resemble watercolor washes. Although the name contains the word “tint”, this is a black-and-white printing process; aquatint plates can often be hand colored, however.
Armorial Used to describe a binding bearing the coat of arms of the original owner, or with bookplates incorporating the owner’s arms.
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Boards Hard front and rear covers of a bound book which are covered in cloth, leather or paper. “Original boards” refers to cardboard-like front and back boards, from about 1700 to 1840, used as temporary protection for books before their purchasers would have them bound. Of particular value to collectors as evidence of a very early form of the book.
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Collation Process by which the contents of a book are inspected for completeness, checking against internal evidence, the table of contents and/or plate list, and reference works. Also a shorthand bibliographical description of a book’s composition by its leaves and signatures, rather than its pages. A-C, for example, would indicate a quarto volume composed of three signatures or gatherings of eight pages each for a total of 24 pages.
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Doublure Pastedowns made not of paper but of leather, for decorative purposes.
Duodecimo (12MO) Smaller than an octavo, typically less than six inches tall; smaller formats, such as 24mo and 32mo, are uncommon.
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Half Title Leaf preceding the title page that bears the book’s title, originally used to identify the unbound text block. The book’s binder would often remove and discard the half title at the time of binding. Remaining half-titles are therefore of interest to collectors.
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Wood-Engraving Engraving made with the graver or burin on the cross-section of a piece of boxwood; the harder wood and finer tools allow for more delicate, finely detailed images, while the block can still be set in the page alongside text and printed on the same stock as the text. While much older, wood engravings enjoyed an important renaissance in the late eighteenth century through Thomas Bewick and continued in popularity thorugh the nineteenth century.
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