FS LE Statistics

The present Folio Society Limited Editions program started in 2001 with "Benedictional of St Aethelwold".
Since then the FS has produced LEs regularly. The list below does not include the 39 volume Letterpress Shakespeare series.
The numbers produced each year have varied significantly thus:-
YEAR No. SHORTENED TITLE
2001 (2) St.Aethelwold; Oxford Classical Dictionary
2002 (4) Kelmscott Chaucer; Lord of the Rings; Queen Victoria Highlands; Hobbit; Oxford English Dictionary
2003 (5) Morte D'Arthur; Samuel Pepys; Silmarillion; Oxford Thesaurus; Tractatus de Herbis
2004 (2) St.Edmund; Ulysses
2005 (3). Don Quixote; Night Thoughts; Queen Mary Atlas
2006 (4) Johnson's Dictionary; Luttrell Psalter; Surinam Album; War & Peace
2007 (3) Decameron; Four Gospels; Holkham Bible
2008 (6) Alice's Adventures; Les Miserables; Liber Bestiarum; Metamorphoses; Temple of Flora; Wind Willows
2009 (7) Fitzwilliam Book of Hours; King Henry Prayer Book; King Henry Map; Moby Dick; King Henry Music; History England; Rubaiyat of Omar Khayham
2010 (5) Hereford Map; Aeneid; Canterbury Tales; Ancient Mariner; Robert's Holy Land
2011 (7) Candide; Gulliver’s Travels; Birds of Paradise; Bible; Fairie Queene; Troillus Criseyde; Getty Apocalypse
2012 (6) Gould Birds; Japan; Just So; Leaves Psalter; South Polar Times; Sound Fury
2013 (4) La Fontaine; Thomas Gray Poems; Arabia Deserta; van Gogh Notebooks
2014 (5) Goya War Disasters; Magna Carta; Herfordshire Pomona; Odes of Horace; Toilers of the Sea
2015 (5) Rupert Brooke Poems; Duke's Children; Golden Ass; Winchester Psalter; Pearl Manuscript
2016 (7) Alice in Wonderland; Plants of Americas; Door in the Wall; Mort; Tales From 1001 Nights; Hansel & Gretel; Poetic Edda
2017 (9) Edward Thomas; Riddley Walker; Cthulhu; Bayeux scroll; Micrographia; Count of Monte Cristo; Genesis; Book of Job; Song of Songs
2018 (6) Love is Enough; Wanderer; I Am legend; Kama Sutra; Cinderella; Wilfred Owens
2019 (6) Gargantua and Pantagruel; London & New York; New Sun; Studies from Nature; Dracula; Dr. Zhivago
2020 (7) Pilgrim's Progress; Babar; Tristram Shandy; Madam Bovary; Dune; Histories by Herodotus; Letters From Fairyland
2021 (6) Three Musketeers; Complete Stories by Dick; Hardy Poems; Rob Roy; Divine Comedy; Aurora Australis
2022 (8) Ulysses; Haunting Hill House; Lord of the Rings; Gormenghast; Peter Rabbit; Turn of the Screw; Frankenstein; Waste Land
2023 (9) Peloponnesian War; Roadside Picnic; Casino Royale; Hitchhiker's Guide; Beowulf; Always Lived Castle; Shadow of the Wind; Complete Shakespeare; Moonstone
2024 (9) Long Way to a Small Angry Planet; Origin of Species; King of Elfland's Daughter; 1984; Leibowitz; Neuromancer; Book Thief; Mystery & Imagination; Hobbit
2025 (9) Lottery etc.; Perdido Station; Great Gatsby; Mythago Wood; It; Iliad & Odyssey; Jane Austen set; Christmas Carol; Last Unicorn
2026 Anna Karenina; American Psycho; Howl's Moving Castle; Moby Dick
TOTAL 144 (to end 2025).

Thank you for this list. Does anyone remember the War And Peace details?

>1 wcarter:

Thanks for this very handy and useful list. I'm very alarmed to see I succumbed to about half of them (not including the 39 volume Letterpress Shakespeare series). Please don't remind us how much they cost in case my wife sneaks a look.

Even more details can be found on the FSD Group Page at:-
http://www.librarything.com/wiki/index.php/Groups:Folio_Society_Devotees

>2 BINDINGSTHATLAST:
War and peace LE
Presented in a buckram-bound solander box, together with a booklet, 'What is War and Peace?' by John Bayley. Bound in metallic gold paper with an inset label. Bound in full goatskin leather, blocked with a design by Jeff Clements commissioned exclusively for this edition and inspired by sketches of troop positions. Set in Poliphilus. Over 300 drawings by Feliks Topolski. Size: 10" x 6¼", 1440 pages.

5

Reminds me of the The History of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russell

>3 boldface: Ugh, 40% here including half the Shakespeare.

>3 boldface:
>7 kdweber:

A mere 17% here. You make me feel positively frugal! Mind you, that rises slightly if you include the Letterpress Shakespeare (19%), and rises massively if you include all of the various proto-LEs prior to 2001 (limited special bindings, Folio Fine Press Editions, etc, as described at length in previous threads).

On 19% here, alarmingly enough. Nearly all of my LEs are medieval facsimiles, unsurprisingly!

>6 LesMiserables: It sure does



The cover design is of course by the same designer as the cover for War and Peace (and many other FS LE and non-LE editions) Jeff Clements.

My copy of The History of Western Philosophy has some interesting extra information. I purchased an ex-file copy from the Members Room a number of years ago, and it has some inventory information in light pencil on the first page. It says:

File Copy 1/2 1st Folio Edition. June 2004

Print : 13,000
Selling : £39.95
Unit : £14.07

Of these, I have:

-St Aethelwold (from Ardis Books - a bargain as it was under cost price);

-Silmarillion (someone put up a load of LOTR limiteds, so I went for the one that I thought would go for the cheapest, and I was right - I think I paid under £100 for it);

-Johnson's Dictionary (I remember seeing a facsimile when I was about 18 for something like £150 and regretted that there was no chance I could afford it. When the FS produced it - and I was only just joining - I had to stump up for it);

-Four Gospels (Eric Gill was totally hatstand, but I love his work);

-Holkham Bible (think it was my "four books" at the start of a year);

-King Henry Map (with an LE voucher it was £50, I think, really one cannot miss with that sort of thing);

-South Polar Times (I love Antarctic exploration and had picked up in Stow for an absolute song the Paradigm facsimile of Aurora Australis - something like £20 as opposed to £200 - so this is the perfect companion. Perhaps the most expensive penguin classic ever...)

-Arabia Deserta (I had just booked a holiday to Arabia when this came out, so...).

I intend to get Golden Ass when the credit card date clicks over another month...I'm not normally a fan of Quentin Blake, but I've seen the illos in the dMR and they suit the work perfectly.

>10 Conte_Mosca:
The Russell "History" is the only non-LE edition I know of that was fully bound in goatskin.

I have 30/67 (45%).

I have 44 out of the 67, so nearly two-thirds. I don't think there are any on my wish list left so I am probably not interested in the remaining 23.

Here is my inventory, shamelessly copied, pasted and edited from the first post:

2001 (2) St.Aethelwold
2002 (3) Chaucer; Queen Victoria Highlands;
2003 (5) Morte D'Arthur; Samuel Pepys;
2004 (2) St.Edmund;
2005 (4) Night Thoughts; Getty Apocalypse; Queen Mary Atlas
2006 (5) Johnson's Dictionary; Liber Bestiarum; Luttrell;
2007 (3) Four Gospels; Holkham Bible
2008 (7) Alice's Adventures; Henry Prayer Book; Les Miserables; Temple Flora; Wind Willows
2009 (6) Fitzwilliam; King Henry Map; Moby Dick; Rubaiyat
2010 (4) Aeneid; Canterbury Tales; Ancient Mariner
2011 (7) Candide; Gulliver; Birds of Paradise; Fairie Queene; Robert's Holy Land; Troillus Criseyde
2012 (6) Gould Birds; Just So; Sound Fury
2013 (4) La Fontaine; Thomas Gray Poems; van Gogh
2014 (5) Goya War Disasters; Ode Horace; Toilers Sea
2015 (4 up to July) Duke's Children; Golden Ass; Winchester Psalter

My version of Duke's Children is the standard one, not the super deluxe marbled end pages. I saw this last month in the dMR and while it is beautiful, I do not have any regrets at not doubling my price for the added finishes. I fortunately have never been bitten by the Letterpress Shakespeare bug since I have complete Shakespeare in so many other editions.

I have occasionally been tempted by the Tolkeins, War & Peace, Decameron and Don Quixote, but it is very difficult for me to justify spending that much money when a standard edition has identical interiors (and I own all of the standard versions). I wish I could talk myself into Metamorphoses as it is the proper genre for my collection, and I do love Titian, but it just does not feel special enough to me to justify the price and I am not a fan of the pasted in fold-out illustrations.

As it is, my LE collection has cost me (several obtained second hand, sometimes at higher than FSRP when sold out and sometimes lower) just over a staggering $30,500, not including the cost of shelving them. Night Thoughts was the most expensive at $1,683 and unsurprisingly the cheapest was Journal of Our Life In The Highlands (which is hardly even an LE and not in the same category as the others really) at $99. LEs represent 57.5% of my overall Folio inventory by cost, but only 4% of the titles! It looks like 2011 was my biggest LE year with 6 of the 7 titles. In no year have I purchased all offerings, and my least represented appears to be 2003 with only 2 out of 5.

Interesting statistical exercise!

Addendum: of the 41 / 44 Folio Limited Editions for which I have market data (US sales only), the LE that has least held its value by percentage is King Henry's Map with an average sales price of $59 compared to my $195 cost (a loss of 69.7%). In terms of percentage, the one with the greatest appreciation is Sound and Fury (which is why I am keeping it even though it underwhelms me) with an average sale price of $1,233 vs. my cost of $335 or an increase in value of 267.9%.

In terms of dollars, the biggest loser is my beloved Faerie Queene, with an average sale of $703 vs. my cost of $1,045 (a loss of $342 or 33%) and again the biggest gainer is Sound and Fury with an appreciation of $898 over my cost of $335.

22 of the 41 with sales price data have gained in value and 19 have lost value. Overall I am ahead slightly with a "market value" of $31,400 vs. cost of $30,500, but keep in mind the sales data points are extremely limited, often only one price point comparison so I don't really consider this a good measure of the value of my LE collection. As they say, the market price is whatever someone is willing to pay at the point of sale. For obvious reasons of newness, I do not have any "market" sales data on Duke's Children, Winchester Psalter or Golden Ass but I imagine the first and third will appreciate and the second will never hold its cost given the limited audience/appeal (and scholasticus/Greg already has his own copy so there goes my audience!) :-)

>15 UK_History_Fan: Are those average selling prices for actually completed sales, for volumes in brand new condition? I ask because asking prices on the secondary market are often optimistic to the point of deluded. Also, I imagine the additional cost for shipping, for hefty items such as Faerie Queene, would be far more on the secondary market than the amount charged by Folio.

>15 UK_History_Fan:

Indeed, there goes your audience! :)

Quite the list you have there! I, too, am sometimes tempted by Shakespeare, but then I look at the however many (in)complete sets of Shakespeare I have and decide that it's not worth going down that rabbit hole!

I think my next LE purchases will be (not necessarily in this order):
- Arabia Deserta
- Poetic Edda
- Pearl MS.

The latter two are, naturally, autobuys for me - sigh. Still waiting for Jonathan and Faisel to stump up the cash to buy me a copy of Arabia Deserta - hint, hint. ;)

>17 scholasticus:

Oh yes, my friend it would be a well deserved gift from me to you as soon as I nail that Euro lottery on Friday.

>18 ironjaw: Don't you dare, that's my bailout.

> 16
Yes, completed sales with shipping. I would never put an asking price in my database as it could be "pie in the sky" wishful thinking. Only on eBay though so I do not know of any way of seeing "sold" listings on ABE or Amazon.

>17 scholasticus: join us Greg...join the Letterpress Shakespeare side...it is more powerful than you can possibly imagine...

No Greg, stick with me, resist the temptation, and save your canadian pennies for more original or hard to find titles!

>20 UK_History_Fan: That seems pretty rigorous then if the volumes were all in new or pristine as-new condition. I wonder whether LEs with a higher limitation (over 1000) can be expected to hold their value less, given the likely greater secondary market supply. The number one faller, King Henry's Map, that you mention above has a very high limitation of 2,750. But then of course it must depend on simple popularity too: Alice's Adventures Underground had an even high limitation (3,750) and seems to have better maintained its price.

>22 UK_History_Fan:
Sadly our pennies have been retired in Canada. Now it is save your nickels or beaver pelts. Preposterous inflation I tell you!

>17 scholasticus:

As for stumping up cash, I'm afraid my wallet currently resembles the Empty Quarter.

>21 BINDINGSTHATLAST:, >22 UK_History_Fan:

Sorry, Tim! Going with Sean here, as I already own the LEC Shakespeare, the single-volume Oxford Shakespeare, a few Nortons, and bits and bobs from various other series, and am currently hoping to collect the individual Oxford Shakespeares, which are a LOT cheaper than FS' dressed-up versions.

>24 gatsby61:

Beaver pelts, eh? Perhaps I should raid the local museum for the pelts they have on display, particularly if they're worth more than a few nickels each. ;)

>25 boldface:

Mine too, sadly!

If my memory serves me well then the Getty Apocalypse LE appeared in June 2011 and not in 2005 as is shown in the opening post statistics; Robert's Holy Land is much earlier then 2011, could be 2005. Perhaps these two are swapped in the overview?

Just had a quick check and I have about 34 LEs of the 67 published, I do not want to know what these treasures have cost me :-)

>27 ExportFrisian:
Just checked my copy of Robert's Holy Land, and it is marked as being published in 2010.
I have amended the list at the beginning of this post accordingly.
Can't confirm the Getty Apocalypse date, as my recently ordered copy has not yet arrived. Can someone else check a copy?

>28 wcarter:

I've a folder into which I generally deposit all FS emails, and from a quick check I see that I was informed of the Getty Apocalypse publication in July 2011, and of the David Roberts books in May 2010.

Interestingly, the Fitzwilliam Book of Hours was announced on November 5th 2009, and a follow-up email on 3rd December was to the effect that almost a half of the limitation had been sold.

>29 terebinth:
Thank you. Data base further amended.
Any further corrections anyone?

I snatch up 8 volumes before suddenly realize that LE are too expensive for me .

2008 Alice's Adventures, Les Miserables;
2009 Moby Dick;
2010 Robert's Holy Land
2011 Gulliver
2012 South Polar Times; Sound Fury
2013 Arabia Deserta

When was the Liber actually published? Here it's says 2006 but the book has it listed for 2008. Were there 2 batches?

>32 JuliusC:

Again checking my Folio emails, the one announcing Liber Bestiarum is from February 2008, with delivery to begin in April.

>32 JuliusC: >33 terebinth:
Thank you. Initial entry at top of this discussion, and FSD wiki altered to show correct date.
2008 was a record year with eight LEs released.

>34 wcarter:

Perhaps someone owning the work can confirm its stated year of publication, but it could be that King Henry's Prayer Book belongs to 2009 rather than 2008: my email announcing it came in '09, on the 29th of January.

>35 terebinth:
King Henry's Prayer Book was indeed published in 2009.
Database amended yet again!

Of these, I have:

2001 Oxford Classical Dictionary
2003 Samuel Pepys; Tractatus de Herbis
2004 St. Edmund
2006 Johnson's Dictionary; Luttrell Psalter
2007 Holkham Bible
2008 Liber Bestiarum; Metamorphoses
2009 Fitzwilliam; Moby Dick; Rubaiyat
2010 Aeneid
2011 Fairie Queene
2013 Thomas Gray Poems; Arabia Deserta
2014 Ode Horace
2015 Duke's Children

All this information about Limited
Editions is fascinating , but where will I find the answer to the question , what is the print run of the limited editions vs the print run of ordinary Folio society books? Secondly , I presume that the print runs became larger as the FS became an established institution ?

I am giving a short talk on rarity and price for FS books, so one issue I wanted to cover is the relationship between quality , mass production and long term value/price. This interests the antiquarian books enthusiasts.

My talk will look at the 1948 publication of the Singer volume on the Earliest Chemical Industry ( I have written about this book in earlier threads and also wrote a review ) . This was a commissioned early volume , 1100 copies printed and today the price runs from $129 to $373 ( median price about $200 ) . Do you think there is a relationship between secondary market (OUP ) prices and print runs? Or is it popularity of the specific title or some other unusual feature ( eg the. 1953 As You Like it with lithographs by Salvador Dali ) that influences the price . The Hobbit is another (ordinary ) FS book that commands a good price.

One picks up the fact that membership is in the range of
140000 but print runs would be much much lower . I wonder too whether as the membership base rose and the number of titles published a year rose too , whether the print runs moved in the opposite direction?

I have more than enough to say for a 10 minute mini talk !

>38 Africansky1: I can give you the figures which are pencilled-in to the front of my copy of Myths of the Near East, which was the FS File Copy and which I purchased from the NT:

First Edition Aug 2003
Print : 10,000
Selling : £42.50
Unit : £12.20

I would doubt that membership is anywhere near 140,000 these days and I would estimate it to be closer to 50% of what it has been in the past.

>39 HuxleyTheCat:
According to this article from July 2014,

At any one time, the company has between 80,000 and 100,000 members, people who are required to spend $200 or buy 4 books a year to retain their membership. The company also reports that there is are “low tens of thousands of people who buy one or two books or a handful at Christmas.”

http://publishingperspectives.com/2014/07/how-the-uks-folio-society-is-changing-...

>38 Africansky1: And I give similar info for The History of Western Philosophy in post 11 above, with a print run of 13,000.

Print run, and therefore secondary market availability, undoubtedly affects value, and not all standard edition print runs are the same. Generally though, I suspect that value is particularly increased when other factors also come into play, a key one being whether the title in question forms part of a larger set. Where that happens, the rarer title commands a much higher price than its brethren, and is often one of those very rare beasts - a title that has held its original value (or even rarer, increased in value).

Take for example the Karla Trilogy by John Le Carre. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy has been reprinted many times, and available for several years. Its second hand value is negligible (say £8-10). The other titles, The Honourable Schoolboy and Smiley's People generally fetch more than double that, having each only had a single print run (I believe) and were available for a very limited period.

An even starker example is Paradiso, which has been mentioned often on these boards. Inferno and Purgatorio each command about £50-80 second hand. Paradiso sells for about £250-300. Paradiso had a single print run and was available for what appeared to be a ridiculously short time.

Or The Icelandic Sagas II, which commands about £50, where volume I (and indeed most of the rest of the Myths and Legends series) sell for c£15-20. I suspect (but am only guessing) that the print run is smaller given the much less frequent availability on the secondary market.

There are other titles which are not part of sets that also appear to have had short print runs, and command a higher than usual secondary market price. The Secret Life of Trees springs to mind.

Thank you Huxley, Elladan and Conte _Mosca for these speedy replies . My talk is this morning and I have decided my "show and tell " will be the Singer volume , George Du Maurier Trilby , Folio 21 ( to illustrate the bibliographic element ) a volume of the Surtees series (hand plates by John Leech ), the Stanley exploration in Africa (the idea of a series of great interest to Africana collectors) and Strachey Emminent
Victorians . ( FS did more than one edition and got better all the time ). They are going to have to put a sock in my mouth at the 10 minute mark! I shall give you all feedback as to audience response and questions asked .

>42 Africansky1: You could mention Folio 25 (which consists of Folio 21 plus Folio 1968-71) is typically several times the cost of buying both lesser volumes separately, to illustrate the effect of rarity (only 330 or thereabouts were produced). And I've seen a couple of copies of Icelandic Sagas II sell for £100 or more simply because so fewer were published than the first volume. Of course much depends on the condition of the second hand volume, as new-in-shrinkwrap can command significantly more than an opened, used copy even if advertised as 'fine'. The binding cloth for Icelandic Sagas is unusually vulnerable to rubbing at the corners which may further contribute to pristine copies of either volume commanding even higher prices.

I would say that the Myths and Legends series have held their value reasonably well, with the notable exceptions of Myths of Ancient Greece, Legends of King Arthur and M&L of Britain which regularly sell for around £15 because they had such large print runs and were also issued in a 3-volume format with cheaper binding. Additionally, Legends of King Arthur has become cheaper probably because of material overlap with the more attractively illustrated Legends of the Grail, issued in a smaller print run and significantly more expensive. Celtic Myths and Legends, Icelandic Sagas I, Legends of Ancient Rome and Legends of the Near East can easily sell for over £30 in as-new condition. M&L of Russia and Irish Myths and Legends now cost far more than the original FS price, around £100 as-new, probably a result of the popularity of the illustrations as well a comparatively limited print run.

I hope your talk goes well!

Thanks Cronshaw for your suggestions . My short talk went well and I think stretched beyond the 10 minutes , a small audience it was rather like giving a tutorial! Funny in a small group there were people who had never heard of FS and liked the introduction to the subject. I chose books to show that I had to hand on my shelves , and the Stanley appeals to a S African bunch of bibliophiles . My Folio 21 was accessible , though I made reference to the other bibliographic volumes and why these are important. The focus of the talk came down to the durability of the FS model from Ede to Gavron (but also the limitations). Made me think about the influence of earlier private presses and traditions of beautiful books . The talk I gave was videoed and I think will go up on You tube or some other social media platform . I shall let you know when there is a link but all your replies and my thinking about the importance and success of FS makes me want to write all this up as an article (where to post on line?). Thank you so much everyone for your efforts to answer my questions . I should add they my audience enjoyed looking at the FS books I took along. We also discussed which South African books we would recommend for FS publication . It was a book fair and I did purchase 4 books in the morning but no FS (not so easily come by in Jozi.) I have not bought an FS volume now for about a year or so .

>6 LesMiserables: Quite elegantly bound. I'm not sure they did this for any reprints. I was always surprised that, given the topic and the size, that it received this treatment. While not an LE, I'm glad to have a copy.