I recently heard from fellow PAN Fan, Gareth Brown, who sent me some photos of the original artwork he has plus a fantastic rotary book stand, me jealous, not half! He said “I lost a number of books in a flood years ago and I’ve not been the in-depth collector over the years, this was mainly in the 70s/80s. But I went to see the Art Director at Pan when I was a teenager to express my fandom and he very kindly gave me these”
The covers Gareth got were for ‘The Eighth Mrs Bluebeard’, ‘Lucy Crown’, ‘The Case of the Hesitant Heiress’, ‘Deep Water’ and ‘Holiday for Inspector West’
On the 20th March there was a auction of several lots of books including PANs and Penguins at Warren and Wignall, Auctioneers, in Leyland, Lancashire. The auction was also the online via “The Saleroom’ website. The three PAN lots were as follows;
1) Pan Books, a large collection of the first numbered series, 1 – 443, (missing numbers 164, 182, 191-197, 210, 213, 241, 251, 253, 271, 297, 301, 341 & 392), also including six of the first un-numbered editions. These sold for £2,100
2) Pan Books, a collection of mainly assorted G series paperbacks, 1958 to 1966, various authors including Ian Fleming, Agatha Christie etc. including a small number of the first numbered series, 1947-1958, approximately 142 in total. All of the Ian Fleming books appear to be first Pan Books editions, one of the Agatha Christie books is also first Pan Books edition, The Mysterious Affair at Styles is first Pan Books 6th printing. These sold for £300
3) Pan Books, a near complete collection of GP series paperbacks, 1-102, 1947 to 1958, (missing GP11, GP31 & GP101), various authors including Ian Fleming and Agatha Christie etc. includes some duplicates. These sold for £200
To the prices you needed to add 25% commission if you were in the room and another 8% on top if by phone or online. What about VAT? They do not ship so I suppose you had to go and collect them in person. If those are the going rates then even if I sold all my books I don’t think I’d make enough for that Round the World cruise!
Having picked up another copy of ‘Lust for Innocence’ by Dianne Doubtfire I was amazed to find it was an unsigned copy. I have three more copies of this title, all signed, plus ‘Reason for Violence’, signed and at least another four of her children’s books all signed. To find one unsigned seems to be the exception to the rule. Oddly I had not noticed that one copy of ‘Lust for Innocence’ and the ‘Reason for Violence’ are both to the same person but I don’t remember buying them at the same time. I’m wondering if the copy of ‘Lust for Innocence’ to Andrea might be Andrea Newman as they were both writing around the same time? Dianne Joan Doubtfire was born in Leeds, Yorkshire on 18th October 1918 and attended Harrogate Grammar School and Slade College of Art. She became a lecturer and tutor in creative writing and twice chaired the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School plus writing a play for the BBC. She married an artist-engraver, Stanley Doubtfire and they lived on the Isle of Wight where she set up the ‘Wight Writers’ Dianne died in West Sussex in May 2000. PAN also published two more of her novels namely X565 ‘Kick a Tin Can’ and ‘The Flesh is Strong’
Some corrections to the above.
Dianne was my father’s first cousin, the daughter of my grandfather’s younger brother. My father was born in 1917 and she was older than him, ? born 1915. I can remember her from my childhood when she lived in Chessington, Surrey.
Her maiden name was Abrams like mine. Her father was killed in WWI around the time of her birth. She was born in Leeds like her father and my grandfather. I don’t know if she ever moved to Harrogate to be nearer her school. My father knew her best socially when she was a student in Central London in the mid-1930s and, as he was there starting out as a civil servant, she invited him to various parties.
She took the first name Dianne when she left home, as she disliked the name Joan. Doubtfire was the name of her husband, Stanley, who became a well-known engraver of bank notes and stamps. He designed the Churchill memorial stamp to mark Winston Churchill’s death in 1965. They had a son called Ashley who died in the 1980s.
In the mid-1950s they had moved to Karachi when her husband was working on the new Pakistan currency. My immediate family lost touch at this point, though I know my father’s elder sister corresponded with her for some further years, as had my grandmother, who owned several of her books.
I currently own a large drawing she made of the Bridge of Sighs in Venice, which was given as a wedding present to my parents. I have also collected several of her novels in my retirement. The early ones, esp. “Lust for Innocence”, give a vivid picture of a lost world, London in the 1950s and 60s, which I remember from my childhood and teenage years.
Hi Shirley, Thanks for this very interesting information. I have sent you an email so we can hopefully talk about it more at length. Regards, Tim