What about it?

The seller says:

Also, the cover is covered again with a protector as you can see, leaving the cover underneath in excellent condition with no rips.

What else do you want to know, besides why it looks like a photocopy?

BH

Khamûl wrote:
What about it?

The seller says:

Also, the cover is covered again with a protector as you can see, leaving the cover underneath in excellent condition with no rips.

What else do you want to know, besides why it looks like a photocopy?

BH

What are you seeing as the tell-tale signs of it being a copy? it looks like a normal jacket under a roughened up (i.e. matte) cheap plastic sleeve to me?

I would feel ill if I had these copies hiding on my shelves, those reproudction jackets are just wasted on these books! Not worth the price of the repro jackets to buy this set, in my opinion.

Update - I was hasty in my reaction which was primarily to the pictures - the discontinuity between the repro jackets and the books underneath. I did not note that these are all first impression books, which (in any condition) would certainly have value to collectors well above what the repro jackets cost.

To be clear, I would have no problem having beat up copies of Tolkien's works on my shelves - in fact I do, for many titles and editions! I don't personally like having pristine reproduction dustjackets hiding the books, is all. I feel the same way about rebindings.

eBay Item #181452594155

The asking price does seem a little absurd given the condition of the books.

Possibly laurel may want to reply

This copy of the Hobbit is quite hard to find, 2nd Edition UK 12th Impression from 1961.

However, if you are looking for this printing, then an example with the dust jacket should only be about £100 less than this seller.

eBay Item #191233275190

I updated my previous post on the LOTR set with reproduction dustjackets, but to reiterate what I said there, here:

I was hasty in my reaction which was primarily to the pictures - the discontinuity between the repro jackets and the books underneath. I did not notice that these are all first impression books, which (in any condition) would certainly have value to collectors well above what the repro jackets cost.

To be clear, I have no problem having beat up copies of Tolkien's works on my shelves - in fact I do, for many titles and editions! I don't personally like having pristine reproduction dustjackets hiding the books, is all. I feel the same way about rebindings.

Urulöké wrote:
I updated my previous post on the LOTR set with reproduction dustjackets, but to reiterate what I said there, here:

I was hasty in my reaction which was primarily to the pictures - the discontinuity between the repro jackets and the books underneath. I did not notice that these are all first impression books, which (in any condition) would certainly have value to collectors well above what the repro jackets cost.

To be clear, I have no problem having beat up copies of Tolkien's works on my shelves - in fact I do, for many titles and editions! I don't personally like having pristine reproduction dustjackets hiding the books, is all. I feel the same way about rebindings.

I must admit, I did think you had been a bit harsh (or that 1/1s of these were getting much cheaper)!

Still, it makes for an interesting (if accidental) experiment. Until you found these books happened to be the first printing, you essentially thought they were tatty junk. Being the first, they somehow ceased to be tatty junk.

Book collecting is an odd business to be sure.

Stu wrote:

Until you found these books happened to be the first printing, you essentially thought they were tatty junk. Being the first, they somehow ceased to be tatty junk.

Just pricey tatty junk.

Seriously, though, book collecting is definitely an odd business. As my wife says, "well, I guess it's better than a lot of other hobbies you could have!"

Urulöké wrote:
Stu wrote:

Until you found these books happened to be the first printing, you essentially thought they were tatty junk. Being the first, they somehow ceased to be tatty junk.

Just pricey tatty junk.

Seriously, though, book collecting is definitely an odd business. As my wife says, "well, I guess it's better than a lot of other hobbies you could have!"

That's pretty much my wife's take on it! I think her biggest beef is that she has to cart a whole load of books back from the UK every year or two when she goes back to visit family. My collecting these days is pretty much entirely on the few-dollars-a-pop end of the scale, which means international postage from the UK makes little sense most of the time (well, that and I'm broke!).