Thread: Barmouth & Charles Dickens

Yesterday, we went to Barmouth for the day. It was a nice day, if a little cloudy and blustery, though not cold. After building a giant sandcastle on the beach, and accidentally treading on and bursting a large dead jellyfish, we made our way to the high street. We drifted past the usual horrid tacky seaside fare, selling rock and bawdy carry-on figures and postcards. We passed a small antiques shop and I noticed in the window there was a display of old penguin paperbacks, at least a hundred of them, all in orange, and all in good condition. It tempted me inside and I was amazed to find the antique shop doubled up as a second hand book store--the very sort I love. The sort where you can smell the age of the paper and ink, almost taste the history and intellect, and where you can stand for an age browsing, never buying, and yet never tiring of looking.

I came across the Dickens section, and a large, hard copy of Little Dorritt, priced at £35. It said on the first page it was published from the original plates (which I think it said was somewhere circa 1870s). There was no date given for its publication, and the shop owner/manager estimated around 1900. It was in very good/excellent condition, though I certainly wouldn't say mint condition.

I was tempted to buy it. I've been meaning to get round to reading Dickens for ten years or so, and I thought what a way to start, though I didn't in the end. Instead I settled for a copy of Oliver Twist, which I'm guessing is about the same age, though maybe a little younger. It's by Chapman & Hall, 193 Picadilly, London. It smells gorgeous. I can't wait to read it, delicately of course, and with clean, grease-free hands, well away from my daughter.

I just can't help wondering if I missed a small investment opportunity in the Little Dorritt.

Any collectible is only worth what someone will pay for it.

Chances are the shopkeeper knows the value of his stock better than any of us do, so you probably only missed out on something that was sentimentally nice, but not worth much.