Least desirable LECs

The Iceman Cometh -- 61 for sale
The Lyrical Poems of Francis Villon -- 50 for sale
Peter Ibbetson -- 48 for sale
The Gentleman from Cracow -- 46 for sale
The Old Wive's Tale -- 45 for sale
The Masque of Comus -- 45 for sale
The Man of Property -- 45 for sale
Pygmalion & Candida -- 45 for sale
The Renaissance -- 45 for sale
Maggie, Girl of the Streets -- 44 for sale
The Bridge -- 44 for sale
Memoirs of an Infantry Officer -- 44 for sale
The Three-Cornered Hat - 42 for sale
The Pilot -- 42 for sale
Roxana -- 42 for sale
The Newcomes -- 41 for sale
The Shaving of Shagpat -- 41 for sale
The Eclogues -- 41 for sale
The Rise of Silas Lapham -- 41 for sale
Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides -- 41 for sale
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack -- 41 for sale
History of Pendennis - 40 for sale
Washington Square -- 40 for sale
The Memoirs of Casanova -- 40 for sale
The Light of Asia -- 40 for sale
Winesburg, Ohio -- 40 for sale

I'm sure they are all lovely books, but not popular today or considered of minor importance.

Interestingly, a couple of them go for higher prices, so sellers aren't desperate and buyers are willing to pay more despite the glut.

Maggie, Girl of the Streets was the first LEC I bought many years ago, and it is a delightful book both to read and to behold.
Well worth purchasing.
Pictures at https://flic.kr/p/2hXiPWr

>1 rogerthat2:
I guess the higher prices tend to stick around. And at least partially correlate with condition, presence of the slipcase and monthly letter, etc.

>1 rogerthat2: Note that there are two different editions of the Francis Villon.

>4 kdweber:

Yes, and the later edition (1979) titled The Lyrical Poems of Francois Villon is noteworthy (infamous) as one of the first LECs to be printed entirely offset, rather than letterpress, and to lack any illustrations. The 1934 edition titled The Lyrics of Francois Villon, printed letterpress and with some rather rude illustrations, which many hated but which seem appropriate to me, is much less commonly found. Again, poetry is not that popular it seems, and although I can't provide statistics, the great majority of books on your list are from the post-George Macy era and from a period of greater limitation numbers (pre-Shiff).

>5 Django6924: But the latter Villon is bilingual... Which probably outweighs the letterpress printing, right? I've seen you say similar with regards to Sir Gawain. :-)

Sir Gawain is half letterpress--there was no metal type in the correct size for the Middle English characters "thorn" (looks like a lower case "b" with a long descender), "eth" (which looks like a lower case "d" with a crooked ascender which is crossed), "yogh" (looks like a cursive lower case "3"), for the "th," "th," and "y/gh" sounds respectively. Plus "wynn" {looks like a lower case "p" for "w" sounds, and sometimes "ash" (æ) for vowel sounds. So the larger size type had to printed using the only size available, then the page photographically reduced for offset printing to match the letterpress translation en face.

Well, I suppose if I were capable of reading Medieval French and understanding the slang of the the underworld subculture of the time which he freely employs, and the numerous private jokes and puns, the bilingual aspect would be important. Since I don't, it isn't. (To get an idea of how frequently arcane the original must be, read Henley's translation of "Villon's Straight Tip to Cross Coves" in an equivalent English 19th century thieves' argot.)

Plus, being a creature of coarser clay, I very much like Simon's grotesque woodcuts (though not the considerable offsetting in my copy), and the deckled pages and handset type.