I’m selling a tatty Harry Potter book for £16,000. Check whether your book contains the same typo
AN ULTRA-rare Harry Potter book, bought from a charity shop for just 13p, will sell for an eye-watering £16,000.
The vintage novel was unearthed 27 years ago by an unsuspecting buyer and is now worth a fortune.
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The scarce copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone was a combination of a few other books purchased in 1997 for a total of 40 cents.
The version is such an early example that the author’s name is even misstated: “JA Rowling” and “Joanne Rowling” instead of JK Rowling.
The “Uncorrected Proof Copy” was one of only 200 copies printed by Bloomsbury 26 years ago and marked the beginning of the Harry Potter phenomenon.
It was purchased in a London bookshop almost thirty years ago and was taken around the world for years before collecting dust on a bedroom shelf.
The book will now go under the hammer on February 26 at Bishton Hall, Staffs., through Hansons Auctioneers with a guide price of £12,000 to £16,000.
The 52-year-old salesman, originally from London but now based in Bologna, Italy, said: “In 1997, when I was 26, I had just returned to Britain and was living in Crystal Palace in London.
“I didn’t have much money, but I always enjoyed treating myself to a round of second-hand bookstores on Saturday mornings.
“I went to one of my usual haunts, one of the second-hand bookshops just off the main drag in Crystal Palace, looking for some Agatha Christie’s.
“Piles of books were all mixed up in baskets on the floor with a maximum price of 40 cents.
“The Harry Potter book was in the piles – maybe even by accident – just like the rest Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, Ngaio Marsh etc, as far as I remember.”
The owner said they bought it along with two other books as a “throw-in” and only paid 40 cents for it.
Since then it has been to China, Taiwan, Britain and now Italy, where it has been packed and unpacked without being read.
“It ended up behind a shelf in my bedroom until,” the owner continued, “for no good reason other than the fact that my children were becoming Harry Potter fans, I went looking for it.
‘Even the children haven’t read it – there are four of them aged from 12 to 25. Unfortunately – or fortunately in this case – they always preferred the movies.
“I was bored one evening scrolling through the Internet when a story popped up about the incredible prices being achieved for Potter books, so I decided to contact Jim Spencer to see if my book would be valuable can be.
“For me to find it when I did was just an enormous amount of well-timed luck for which I will always be grateful and more than a little surprised.”
Hanson’s book expert Jim Spencer has come across only one similar book, which sold for £18,750 at auction last year.
Jim said: “This book has its own story. It has spread all over the world and cost pennies, not even 40 cents.
“Because it was sold with two other books, it actually cost about 13 cents. The previous uncorrected proof copy I discovered went to a school library.
“I’m not sure how this ended up in a London second-hand bookshop, but you have to remember that this was before the first Potter book was even printed.
“This proof copy is where the Harry Potter phenomenon began. This is the very first appearance in print of the first Potter novel.
“The author signing tours, the midnight lines at the bookstores, the movies, the merchandise — it all stems from this.”
The remarkable discovery comes just weeks after another ultra-rare Harry Potter book was auctioned for £10,000 after it was mysteriously dumped at a charity.
A generous donor gave away the first edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone to the Isle of Wight store, where it was expected to fetch a staggering amount due to the many printing errors.
And in December, an extremely rare first edition copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone sold for a whopping £55,000 after being bought for just £10.
The “fantastically well-preserved” edition of the auction achieved the eye-watering price at another sale organized by Hansons Auctioneers at Bishton Hall.
How do you recognize a rare Harry Potter book?
AS JK Rowling’s popularity has skyrocketed, as has the value of the first edition of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.
If you think you may have one, first check to see if Bloomsbury is listed as the publisher on the title page at the bottom.
The copy should be a first edition, which will be noted on the first few pages.
The last date stated in the copyright information must be 1997.
It must be attributed to “Joanne Rowling” and not “JK Rowling” and must include a print line reading “1 0 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1” on the copyright page.
There is an error on page 53 where “1 wand” appears twice in the list of school supplies Harry receives from Hogwarts, which was corrected in later editions.
For the other titles in the Harry Potter series, it is only the first hardcover editions with the dust jacket that have any collector value.